Love Hexagon
by Misery Severity
Summary: Amy Rose returns as a new student in high school after four years of disappearance and she has changed a lot. When she steps in, she immediately became the center of attention and five guys fall in love with her: Sonic, Shadow, Silver, Scourge, and Manic. Although, not everything is great. There's also some typical high school drama going on and see what happens to the Rose.
1. Enter the Rose

**This actually has more than two genres: Romance, Drama, and Humor. Also, it's completely different and sort of AU.  
**

**Don't forget to Review after you Read.**

**All Characters belong to Sonic Team/SEGA/Archie.**

* * *

Enter the Rose

_Four years ago…_

"_I had to leave this world… I can't stand being with him anymore. He is nothing but a jerk—an unfaithful jerk. I caught him cheating on me. I caught him dating that girl with blue eyes, brown fur, and red hair. How could he do this to me? I thought he loves me but it turns out that he's just a player. I can't believe that I fell for this shit. Not only he has cheated on me, he even told me that I'm nothing but a stupid little girl. A fan-girl with serious issues; a fan-girl who needs to understand that a crush is not the same as love; a fan-girl who needs to get away from him and to leave him and his girlfriend alone. I cannot deny—he's right. Now… I have to leave. I don't know where I'm going, but who cares? I want to be anywhere but home. Home is too traumatizing for me to stay. I have to run away… I have to leave everyone I cared about… and never be in this world ever again…"_

_Present Day…_

Today is the day: the first day of school for a special someone.

All around the campus of Chaos High in Station Square, there are Mobian students of different cliques: the athletes, the drama club, the preps, the techs, skaters, rock stars, the mean team, fashionistas, and much more. They can be seen standing and roaming around the school's front entrance yard and inside the hallways in between classes, either gossiping or passing by one another with a quick face-to-face interaction.

What they didn't know yet—is that the school has a new student. Someone new. Someone who is unique from others. Someone who may become Miss Perfect and Miss Popular in seconds once she enters the building. Heck, she may even become the eye candy once she enters her classrooms and greets herself to her classmates.

But who is she?

That's when the time comes.

The double doors to the entrance open and comes in—a pink female hedgehog. Her straightened quills are waist length with her front chin-length bangs swept to both sides of her face, giving a really appealing appearance as her jade-green eyes sparkle like a pair of stars. Her attire bears a striking appearance that is unique from many girls and shows off her perfect slender figure. She's wearing a white sleeveless top that reveals her belly button, a short dark pleaded pink-plaid skirt, fishnet tights, a pair of black combat boots, and to finish it off, a black leather jacket. She's also wearing a black-and-pink checkered messenger bag over her shoulder to carry her school necessities.

As soon as she steps into the building for the very first time, everyone stopped with their conversations and everything is completely silent. They can't help but to stare at her beauty. While walking through the hallways—and the song "What's My Name?" is being heard from a student's radio, playing out-loud—the female hedgehog passes by the students gazing at her.

The way they stare at her is pretty awkward and slightly uncomfortable for her, even when there are more boys giving her flirty comments and whistling at her as she passes by them, and more girls who glare at her with jealous facial expressions. There's also awkwardness between some of the high school couples. An example is when she passes by one of the couples, a green hawk and a purple swallow, this happens:

The green hawk is being hypnotized by the way the hedgehog struts through as the music is playing while the purple swallow is feeling slightly annoyed. When she's finally out of sight for them, the swallow notices that her boyfriend is in some kind of love-spell trance.

"Jet!" she shouts out as she smacks her boyfriend in the back of his head to wake him up.

"What?!" he replies with nuisance.

The hedgehog continues walking until she stops by the admissions booth. She stood at the front window with one of the faculty sitting in her seat on the other side. She glances up at the pink hedgehog.

"Hi," the hedgehog begins. She has her hand resting on the little desk. "I'm new here."

"Last name?" the lady behind the glass asks.

"Rose." She answers and she watches her flip through a box filled with organized paperwork.

"Ah, here we go!" the staff takes out the appropriate papers and hands them to the hedgehog with confidence. "We were expecting you to show up today. Here are your class schedule, your locker number, your school ID, and some other papers that needed to be done by tomorrow and signed by your teachers. I hope you have a great first day."

"Thanks," the hedgehog responses as she carries her paperwork into her bag. She turns into a different direction and resumes walking through the hallways filled with students. Unbelievably, they still can't stop staring at her.

While looking for her assigned locker number, there right in front of her—are the five most popular guys in the school, talking and laughing to one another, and each of them have different cliques. The five happen to be friends for a long time, kind of like brothers—and just like the girl, they're all hedgehogs.

There's Manic the rambunctious rock-star.

Scourge the reckless bad boy.

Silver the intelligent prep.

Shadow the mysterious emo.

And finally the leader of the group: Sonic the arrogant jock.

When the pink hedgehog passes by them, all five of them seem hypnotized by her sexy appearance; just like the other students, they can't help but to remain silent and stare at her. All five are completely stunned. Their eyes are wide and their jaws are dropped. When she notices how they looked at her, the female hedgehog decides to do something that she has never really done before.

She spun around, gave each and every one of them a flirty smile and a cute giggle (quite similar to Rihanna in the song "What's My Name?" that is still playing out-loud through the hallways). She reveals herself as—Amy Rose: the one who ran away from home four years ago before she enrolled into Chaos High. She faces back to the front and resumes strolling to her locker.

"Holy shit…" they all said in unison as they watch her walk away.

"Guys!" a little voice calls out as he runs up to the group along with his friend. They're Tails the Fox, the one who just called out, and Knuckles the Echidna.

"Have you heard? Amy Rose just returned to Station Square and she's now in this school!" Tails continues with enthusiasm. "Can't you all believe that she disappeared for like four years and she suddenly came back?"

"And have you seen her?" Knuckles finishes off with bewilderment, "she's really changed! I'm guessing that puberty did her right!"

They didn't reply at all. It's like they're completely paralyzed. The two notices their numbness.

"I'm guessing they did." the echidna chuckles to the fox.

Back to Amy, she finally finds the locker she's looking for—right next to a group of girls, standing around and leaning against the other lockers. While she's reading the combination from the slip of paper and undoing the lock, the girls begin to glare at her, knowing that she's new in this school.

Soon the locker opens and Amy notices the peculiarity. She glances at the girls for a moment. "Can I help you all?" she asks.

There are five girls in the group and they're all completely different: Mina the Mongoose, Fiona the Fox, Blaze the Cat, Rouge the Bat, and Sally Acorn the Chipmunk. And what Amy doesn't know is that—all five of them are the proclaimed girlfriends of the Hedgehog Gang.

"Are you new here?" Sally asks her with a hint of—malice.

"Yes," Amy replies while organizing her bag inside the locker. "And, have we all met before? You look pretty familiar."

Sally quickly looks at her friends. They shook their heads 'no' and she turns back to the hedgehog. "I don't think so."

"Huh, I could've sworn I've seen you before."

"Well, we don't. I think you're looking at the wrong girls." the chipmunk coldly responds. In reality, Sally did know Amy four years ago before her runaway. Unfortunately, she's the one who Sonic cheated on while he was dating Amy; she's the one who stole him away from her and caused her to mysteriously disappear. No one knows about this—yet.

Amy sighs as she carries on getting the things she needs for her very first class, trying her best to sweep away the bitterness. Blaze, who along with Rouge and Mina happens to be the most sincere and less immoral out of the five, pushes Sally away from her and steps closer to Amy.

"Please excuse her, she's sort of have a slight distaste for new students." The cat informs her, but Amy didn't even look up; she's too busy reading through her schedule.

"Uh huh," she quietly replies.

"Let's start over," Blaze continues with kindness, "I'm—"

"You're Blaze." Amy cuts her off, still not looking at them face-to-face. "And the rest of you are Sally, Fiona, Rouge and Mina."

The girls are pretty shocked. Like she has some kind of gift.

"How did she—"Mina asks with bewilderment.

"It was a lucky guess," Amy answers.

Just when Amy lifts up her arm to close her locker, the sleeve of her jacket suddenly falls down—and the group can see some strange red marks on her wrist. They look like—scars.

"Uh," Mina was the first who notices this. She steps a little closer to Amy. "I don't mean to ask you this, but may I ask what happened to your wrist?"

"Oh," Amy looks at the marks, "I just got into an accident." She answers modestly.

"Accident? What kind—"the mongoose gets cut off when someone else calls out Amy's name.

"Amy!" Amy finally closes her locker and turns to where the voice comes from: Cream and Tikal. The rabbit and the female echidna both ran up to her.

Amy gasps happily when she finally sees two of her closest friends after all these years. "Oh my God! It's you!" and she hugs the two.

"Where have you been?" Cream asks gleefully.

"It's like you were gone forever!" Tikal finishes off.

Before she can answer, Amy turns back at the group. "Sorry everyone, I have to go." She turns back to her friends and the three walk away together, leaving the five feeling completely flummoxed about her sudden behavior.

"So tell us," Tikal persists while holding onto Amy's elbow, "what happened?"

"Nothing much," Amy answers, "let's just say that I wanted to start something new."

Minutes of talking later, it is almost time for first period.

"Sorry Amy, we have to go!" Cream informs.

"We'll see you around, honey," Tikal says.

"Alright, bye." Amy waves goodbye to the two for now and she watches them walk away together to their class.

Now, Amy is left standing by herself in the hallways, searching for the room number she's supposed to go to. Apparently, she's too busy looking through her schedule as she is walking, she couldn't really see where she's walking.

She quietly asks herself, "Now where's room 1010—"and then…

She lets out a grunt when she bumped into someone and she falls back on to the floor, landing on her rear. Afterwards, she opens her eyes, and she gazes up at whom she just ran into. Her face has a sudden though subtle blush and her eyes begin to shine.

"Sonic…" she whispers inaudibly. It's been so long since the two have last seen together.

"Heh," Sonic replies nervously, "sorry about that." the jock hedgehog holds out his hand to help Amy up from the ground. "I didn't see where I was going."

Amy returns his aid; she holds his hand as she carefully gets up, "No, it's my fault. I was too distracted by my… thing."

She then looks down to pick up the piece of paper that has fallen from her hands. She crouches down to pick it up and unknowingly Sonic was about to pick it up for her. Their hands accidentally touch and the two look up together and made eye contact. They blush in embarrassment and Amy pulls her hand gently away from his, so she can allow Sonic to hand her back her schedule. Simultaneously, they both stand up from the floor.

Sonic takes a quick glance on Amy's schedule, "English Room 1010. Cool." He clears his throat as he gives it to her and she takes it.

"Yeah," Amy replies in awkwardness. "It happens to be my favorite subject."

Suddenly, there's a moment of silence between the two as they make eye contact.

"You've really changed," Sonic compliments, "Tails and Knuckles were right. I just want to say… welcome back, Amy."

"Thanks," she replies.

Needless to say, it's becoming very awkward, especially when they haven't made any form of contact with each other for all these years. Although, it's a good thing that they still remember each other. During their moment, it seems that Sonic is too distracted by her appealing looks; he can't even stop looking at her eyes—and her figure. He remembered back then before she disappeared, she used to be so eccentric and she used to dress up into frilly clothes, like that red dress; she even used to chase him around like a love-sick fan-girl who has a crush on her idol.

But not anymore. That frilly red attire is gone for good and now she's wearing something more—mature and attractive and that black leather jacket really brings out the sexiness in her slender figure. Amy is no longer the eccentric and carefree hedgehog we used to know anymore, she's now becoming more mature with a hint of mysterious than ever.

It seems that Sonic and Amy are alone in the hallways, but they're not.

"Hey!" a voice calls out and has woken up the two from their diversion. They look to see who it was and Amy sees the rest of his friends (however, only three of them are his friends, and only one is his brother). The voice who just called out is Scourge. He continues, "Aren't you going to give us a chance to know her more?"

"Oh yeah," Sonic back at Amy, "Hey, you don't mind if—"

"Sure," she answers right away, "but let's make it quick. I don't want to be late on my first day." And she smiles.

Sonic happily takes Amy's hand once again and he leads her to the rest of the group. Feeling slightly infatuated at the same time, they all smiled their trademarked smiles when they see her.

"Hey," Amy began.

Inarticulately, they responded.

"Hey." Shadow chuckles softly while giving her a sneer that girls love to see.

"Hi." Manic waves one of his drumsticks to show off.

"Hello." Silver gives her a quick wave.

"What's up?" Scourge flicks down his shades and winks at her, along with a mischievous grin.

Amy cannot help but to giggle due to their different personalities.

"Amy," Sonic began. "You remember—"

Immediately, she cuts him off playfully. She first looks at Manic.

"Manic the Hedgehog. Aspiring rock star. Favorite activities include playing the drums, skateboarding, writing his own music, and enjoys being boisterous among friends. Hopefully someday, he would want to start his own rock band and become famous."

Manic is completely wide-eyed. "She's right." He comments with amusement

Next, Amy gazes at Scourge, who is giving her that deviant, though sexy look.

"Scourge the Hedgehog. Chaos High's bad boy. Likes to skip class on occasional times, breaking the school's policies without even showing one care to the world, and even seeks revenge on teachers he dislikes. Also, one of his most prized possessions is his leather jacket with flames that helps him get all the girls."

Scourge flicks his jacket, "You got that right, baby."

Then, the female looks at Silver.

"Silver the Hedgehog. Honor student and prep. Grade point average of 3.7, loves to read, and educate himself into new things and considers himself as an autodidact. Someday when he finishes high school, his biggest desire is to become a professor."

Silver gasps incredulously. "Impressive. And pretty efficient, too." He comments and Amy responds with a cute giggle.

She looks at Shadow.

"Shadow the Hedgehog. Mr. Dark and Mysterious. Doesn't like to be referred to as an 'emo boy', but does enjoy the dark world and loves to write confessional poetry regarding to darkness and his emotions. Plus, he enjoys listening to specific rock music, like Story of the Year and Bullet For My Valentine."

Shadow, being the quiet one, laughs silently as he rubs the back of his quills and blushes subtly.

Finally, Amy glances at Sonic.

"And last but not least, Sonic the Hedgehog. Chaos High's most favorite jock of all time. Captain of the varsity track team and has great leadership skills. Despite being arrogant, he is not like any other jocks; he's too much of a nice guy with a great heart and would never beat up anybody with a weaker side."

Sonic lets out a warm smile and at the same time, he's really surprised. "You're absolutely right, Ames."

In fact, the whole group is surprised; nobody else can correctly describe one another fittingly like that. But the question remains…

"How did you manage to know all of this?" Shadow asks incredulously. "Are you psychic or something?"

"You sure have a way with knowledge." An impressed Silver tells her.

Amy is feeling modest about this. Just when she's about to come up with an excuse, the school bell rings. It's already time for first period.

"There goes the bell. Time for class." Before she heads off, she quickly takes out a little notepad from her messenger and writes down her number. Then she tears the paper out and hands them to Sonic while giving them a flirty look. "You can all share the digits with each other if you like. See you around." She winks at them and then she turns around, strolling away to her class.

The guys begin to watch her leave—in infatuation. Once again, they begin to go into some kind of trance as they think about her.

"My God, she's so fucking perfect." Shadow says.

"She's astounding," Silver comments dreamily.

"I think I want to date her." Sonic informs to himself.

"I think I want to marry her." Manic says.

"I so want to bang with her." Scourge says by impulse.

Everyone else shook their heads to wake up and gaze at the bad hedgehog with peering facial expressions. "What?" he responds.

Just then, the second bell rings—it's the warning bell, reminding the students that they're halfway late and all of the hallways needed to be dispersed before the third bell rings.

"Oh, crap," Manic notifies, "we better get going." With that, they grabbed all of their belongings and the hedgehogs ran off to their separate ways.

As soon as they're completely gone, five girls from earlier suddenly appeared out of the corner of the corridors. They have been eavesdropping this whole time; they heard everything Amy has said about—their so-called boyfriends—and they even heard about what they have said about _her_.

There's envious and suspicion written all over their faces, knowing that something is not right—about Amy Rose.


	2. Perfect

Perfect

First period is already done and English class was going great for Amy, especially when she gets to read 'Wuthering Heights' as the assigned reading. Her next class is History, then Trigonometry, Lunch, Art, Biology, and finally Physical Education. Even though none of her friends were in the same class in English, Amy couldn't wait to see who she will be with in History.

Right before the second warning bell rings, she finally makes it to the appropriate classroom with her notebook in her arms. There, she sees some students sitting on top of desks and standing around the back of the room, having some mindless incoherent conversations before the teacher walks in. However, what really catches her eye is that prep hedgehog sitting in his desk in the front row, reading through his notes.

Amy smiles when she sees that empty desk right next to Silver. Soon, she's about to walk up to that desk, albeit—Blaze, who didn't notice her yet, rushes in and immediately sits down adjacent to him. It's first come, first serve. This made Amy frown a little.

Blaze is smiling at Silver as she stares at him while setting her bag down on the floor beside her. She happens to have some similar personalities as the prep hedgehog; she is as smart as him and normally, she is the brains of the group she's in. She usually wears clothes that resemble a school girl, from plaid skirts of different colors with matching ties to dark shaded sweaters and some adorable hair accessories.

"Hi, Silver," she tells him. Silver looks up at her, but he looks slightly unimpressed with her. It seems that the two have a complex relationship, but it's unknown for now.

"Oh, hi," Silver replies wryly.

Blaze is about to give him a warming hug, but something else is distracting him. When he sees Amy walking to another desk in the second row—about three seats away—Silver smiles sympathetically. He can even see that almost-gloomy expression on her face.

He looks back at Blaze. "Blaze," he says, "you don't mind if you sit somewhere else for today?"

The cat is perplexed. "Why?"

"Just for today, no big deal." Silver gazes back at Amy and she returns the eye contact. The pink hedgehog tries to let out a smile, and Blaze sees their connection.

"Please, Blaze?" Silver asks. She thought about it; the feeling is making her envy, but because she's too much of a good person, she cannot deny the offer. She sighs as she grabs her bag from the floor and stands up.

Silver gestures Amy to come sit with him and she accepts. Both Amy and Blaze switch desks; with that done, the cat is beginning to feel doubtful about the way the two hedgehogs look at one another, smiling and blushing.

"It's just a little switch," Blaze thought to herself in her head, "nothing bad. I just hope nothing can go wrong. I just hope… she won't take Silver away from me."

Minutes passed by and the second and third bell have rung already. The lecturer walks into the classroom and the students right away stop their conversations, and then quickly take their seats.

"Good morning, class," he greets while setting his messenger bag and a binder full of paperwork on his desk. Afterwards, he takes a dry-erased marker and writes down on the whiteboard. "Now, before we move on to the next part of the topic," he faces to the class, "let's see how much we remember from what we've covered from our previous lecture."

The lecturer puts the cap back onto the marker. "Who can briefly explain the 15th Amendment of the Constitution?"

Immediately, Silver answers, "Granting the right to vote to all citizens with no denial. Completely ratified in 1870."

"Very good," the educator responds before he turns back to the board to write down some notes.

Amy glances at Silver. "I was right all along. You are pretty intelligent." She whispers to him so the teacher wouldn't hear them over the lecture.

"Thanks," he whispers back with a smile, "it's all about memorization." She chuckles.

Blaze tries her best to write down her notes, but the side conversation between the two is making her feel distracted from doing do. She now has the urge to break her pen in her fist. Or better yet, set her notebook on fire.

"Now, moving further ahead, who knows what the 19th Amendment is all about?"

Wanting to at least get attention from the smartest hedgehog in class, the cat answers. "It's the prohibition of the possession of alcohol."

There's a pause. "Close. But no." Silver chuckles softly.

"Actually," the entire class gives the new student attention. Amy answers with no hesitation, "the 19th Amendment is forbidding the rejection of the right to vote regarding to gender, which led to a significance of women's rights. The prohibition to the purchase and possession of alcohol is really the 18th Amendment." She looks at Blaze. "You're actually one Amendment apart."

"I knew that," Blaze mutters in disappointment under her breath.

"That's correct." The lecturer replies, "thank you, Miss…" he trails off.

"Amy Rose." The pink hedgehog responds, "I'm new here." Behind her, she can hear the classmates complimenting about her in disjointed whispers.

She and Silver make another eye contact. They smirk at each other once again and Silver gives her a subtle thumbs up. This made Amy blush a little. Seeing this moment for the cat has made her feel—more envy in the inside. However, she tries her best to control her jealousy throughout the rest of the period.

* * *

Several hours passed by. With Trigonometry done and she used her lunch period to go to the library instead, Amy is now in the Art classroom. She's just sitting in one of the tables all alone, doing some sketching on paper, and minding her own business. As for the rest of the students, they're either working on their own pieces of art and/or getting the supplies they needed.

"Look at her," Fiona Fox whispers to Mina about Amy while they're sitting together three tables down, trying to do their work, but are too busy having their own conversation together. "Just look at her, sitting all by herself like a pathetic little runt she is."

"Fiona," Mina replies, "I get the whole idea that she's new and already becoming popular in seconds, but being a hater won't solve anything but to make things worse. And besides, she's not even doing anything."

Amy hears their small talk and she glances at them for a mere second; Fiona gives her a sinister look, like she wanted to harm her. Amy, feeling scared, turns away from them and resumes doing her art assignment.

"You know what I've heard?" Fiona continues; she has come up with a rumor, "I've heard that she's a slut. She's trying to get all of the guys in this school, even the ones who are already taken."

"What?" Mina gasps, "No, that's impossible."

At that moment, Scourge appears with a small heart-shaped box in his hands. It's pink and it has a small red ribbon on the lid. He's casually walking through the aisle between the art tables and he passed by the two. Fiona grins.

"Hey, Scourge," Fiona seductively greeted while stopping him for a moment. He looks at her, feeling bothered. She looks at the box he's holding. Still remaining flirtatious, she asks, "Who's that for? Is it for me?" and she's about to take it from him.

The bad hedgehog pulls it away from her, "What the fuck are you talking about? We're not even together anymore." he remarks coldly. "This is not for you, this is for someone else."

This disappoints her, "What? Who?"

"That's none of your business." Scourge resumes strolling away from Fiona and—she, along with Mina, watches him go to Amy. He stood adjacent to her, grinning while giving the pink hedgehog the box. Turns out that the box is really a present for her and she smiles at him back. From their point of views, it seems that both Scourge and Amy are really—together. She gets up from her seat, and she gives the bad boy a warming hug.

"Thank you so much," they hear Amy say.

Fiona is angered from watching this. She glances back at Mina. "See what I mean?" she snarls, "She already stole Scourge away from me!"

"Well," Mina informs her calmly, "That still doesn't mean that she's a guy-thief. She's basically—"

"Girls!" the mongoose and the fox both jumped. They looked up and they see the art teacher with a French beret on her head, looking disdain. "What are you two doing?"

"Uh, working, like you said." Fiona lies with obnoxiousness. This is because Fiona is the rebellious girl with the attitude, like Scourge, while Mina is an aspiring singer-songwriter, like Manic.

"Yeah right," the lecturer replies with a scoff. She knows that the fox lies all the time and she's always so nonchalant about her missing art assignments. She then gazes down at their—blank art. "Do you think I'm going to fall for that? You do know that this is 20% of your grade."

"Sorry, Mrs. Jade." Mina apologizes innocently.

"Wow! This is amazing!" Manic calls out in bewilderment. Jade turns to where the commotion is; there, she sees Scourge sitting right next to Amy with his arm around hers, and Manic staring at the artwork that Amy has done. "I swear to God, this is like the most realistic thing I've ever seen!"

The sketch is really a still-life of a bouquet of flowers, sitting on Jade's desk. It's greatly drawn with a grayscale done correctly. "Thanks, Manic. Well, I have to be honest, this isn't really the best work I've done." She says modestly and shyly.

"Are you kidding?" Manic exclaims, "You sure have a way with art." Then, he winks at her. She responds with a giggle.

"Hey," Scourge jokingly points to Manic as he pulls Amy closer to him, "You better go easy on the Rose." He snickers.

Jade gazes back at Fiona and Mina. For one last time, she informs them, "You two should be more thorough, like our new student over there." Afterwards, she turns away and strolls away from them.

Fiona glares at Mina. "Maybe you're just overreacting. Just don't let your jealousy take control over you." The mongoose informs her.

"Open your eyes, Mina," she replies, "it looks like she's taking your man away from you, too." Fiona gestures to Manic sitting next to Amy, both are happily laughing with each other. Mina watches them; she gasps when she suddenly saw her crush touching the pink hedgehog's hand as she's still working on her sketch—and his face is suddenly closer to hers. It seems that Manic is flirting with her.

The yellow and purple-haired female suddenly loses her level-headedness and Fiona can see her altering facial expression. "You were saying?" she tells her.

"I so want to kill her," Mina snarls quietly.

* * *

It's time for Biology and today, the class is taking place in the lab. Everyone gathers around with their partners for the semester and then sat in their assigned seats. After the third bell has rung, Rouge quickly appears in the room.

"Rouge," the Biology professor informs sternly, "You're late again."

"Sorry," Rouge apologizes, "it's just that—"

"No excuses, please head to your station." The bat, also known as the stylish one, sighs. Normally, she likes to be fashionably late on occasional times, so she can have her chance to show off her appearance. Due to her narcissistic behavior, it pretty much affects her grades and attendance, but it was worth it for her. Although, the main reason why she does this—is to win over the dark hedgehog.

She strolls straight to her station, and right next to her empty seat—is Shadow. She smiles as she watches her favorite guy staring at the beakers, looking so mysterious as usual. Rouge goes up to her seat, and then sat down, still smiling flirtatiously at Shadow. Shadow notices this, and he looks at her with a solemn look.

"Oh, it's you," Shadow sarcastically says. Just like the rest, he, too, has some personal complications with her.

"Is something wrong, darling?" Rouge replies with a flirty tone and of course, Shadow doesn't like that.

"Yes, you." He responds with coldness. "And I hate to break this to you, but we're going to have a third partner today." Suddenly, his scowl turns into a crooked smile.

Rouge is flummoxed. "Who?"

Shadow chuckles and points to someone behind her, "Her." The bat turns around and she sees—Amy Rose.

"Hey," Amy says as she walks and takes her seat next to Shadow. Both hedgehogs smirk and giggle at each another, and this makes Rouge feel—slightly bothered. "Unfortunately," Amy informs her, "the professor told me that there are an odd number of students in this class, so it looks like we're a trio for now."

Rouge kept a scowl on her face, knowing that this is something that she's not going to like. "Yeah, for now…"

Minutes after the lecture, trays of fetal pigs were given out from table to table—it's time for the dissection. When the three got theirs, Rouge can't help but to feel completely nauseous and disgusted about the dead baby pig right in front of her.

"Oh God," she says to herself inaudibly with her hand covering her mouth and nose. Shadow sees her like this; it makes him laugh.

"You ready, Shadow?" Amy asks with audacity while holding up the scalpel.

"Actually, Rose, would you like to give Bat-girl here the honor to do the first cut?" None of the two knows this, but inside his mind, Shadow wanted to see how Rouge would react if she gets her hands on the pig and laugh at her cowardice.

"Sure," Amy hands the blade to Rouge. Rouge, trying to gather up her courage in order to impress the dark hedgehog, meekly takes it.

"Uh, thanks?" the bat gulps in nervousness. With that said, she begins her task; she slowly inserts the scalpel into the center of the fetal pig's chest while at the same time, trying to control her nausea. Rouge slides the blade down to its belly and soon afterwards—the insides are showing.

Already—her sickening sensation worsens. She starts to gag and right away, she throws the tool from her hands and onto the tray. "I can't do this," she laments.

"Coward," Shadow snickers inaudibly.

"Here, let me do it then," Amy takes the scalpel blade back into her hands and having without any problems, she resumes the dissection for Rouge.

With minutes passing by, both Shadow and Amy are nearly done with their project while Rouge is just sitting there to watch (she refused to get her hands back on the fetal animal). As she watches the two working together, she can't help but to feel envy—especially when they're smiling at one another.

"Did you know," Amy tells him, "that the intestines are really connected together by a peritoneum called the mesentery? Some believed that the intestines literally spill out of the stomach itself, but that's impossible. Obviously, they watch too many horror movies."

Shadow is stunned by the fact, "Wow, that's pretty—coherent." He didn't anticipate her to be that—smart. The female hedgehog responds with an adorable chuckle and a blush.

Rouge, having to watch the entire thing, lets out an inaudible scoff. "I don't believe this." She says to herself.

All the way through the rest of the period, she attempts to control her envious—despite that she has the urge to do something tactless to her.

* * *

"Okay, so let me get this straight," Sally, who is wearing her cheerleader uniform, says as she is talking to the girls out in the hallways, "she's all brains, she's artistic, she can cut up a dead animal without puking, and now you're telling me that—she's a man-stealer?"

"Well, she already took my Scourge!" Fiona exclaims.

"And my Silver!" Blaze complains.

"My Manic!" Mina whines.

"And don't forget, she just stole Shadow away from me!" Rouge finishes off.

Sally is completely disgusted. "Unbelievable! Four guys in one freaking day?!"

"I'm telling you, Sal," Fiona remarks, "something's really messed up with that girl. She's only been here for one day and already she's taking over the whole damn school."

"Just since when Amy has decided to become," Rouge shudders in reluctance for she is about to say the word she doesn't even want to mention, "little Miss Perfect?"

"She could be a perfectionist," Blaze stated, "but in my perspective, she's more of an attention-seeker. I'm assuming that she's faking everything, just to have all the attention she wants."

"You could be right," Mina responds. "Also, is it me, or does anyone else find it weird that she's able to know our names earlier today without the proper introduction? She can even express each guy perfectly in a matter of seconds."

This came to realization. "Oh yeah, I remember that alright. That was pretty creepy." Sally says with her arms crossed and leaning her back against a locker. "But still, how the hell can she—"

Her statement gets cut off when she suddenly hears some familiar giggling. She glances at where the laughter is coming from.

"Shh, here she comes." Sally whispers. Soon the entire group stood silent. Amy appears nearby them—with Sonic, and she's holding onto his arm as they go straight to Amy's locker. Sonic is also holding her bag over his shoulder, like a gentleman. They begin to eavesdrop.

"So Sonic, you and Manic actually have a sister? And all three of you are triplets?" Amy asks the jock.

"Yeah, we are. Fortunately, Sonia doesn't go into Chaos High. She's in some kind of boarding school that is like two hours away from home." He optimistically answers.

"How is that a good thing?"

"Well, I don't like to sound mean, but Sonia always gets on our asses with her nagging and such. Also, she's too much of a beauty queen, and thank God our parents allowed her to stay in a boarding school. But despite it all, we still love her and we can still see her on weekends."

After the small talk, Sonic and Amy made it to her locker, just several yards away from the—glaring—girls. They're still overhearing their personal conversation. They watch as Sonic takes her bag off his shoulder and hands it back to Amy while she's undoing the lock and opens it.

Sonic persists the tête-à-tête, "So, Ames," he rubs the back of his head and then leans his arm against the lockers, "I was thinking, if maybe after school, you want to show up at the football field and watch me practice? By the way, not only I'm on the track team, I'm also on the football team, and I could use some encouragement. Now that Sally and I are broken up, you seem the perfect girl to do so." He smiles at her.

Amy looks up at him and she does the same as him, "Wow, Sonic. I don't know what to say. But—how can I say no to that face of yours. Of course, I'll show up—just for you."

He chuckles softly, "And afterwards—would you like to go hangout with me and the guys? After all, it's Friday, which means we can do whatever the hell we want before the weekend."

"It's a date—well, sort of." The two laughs at the joke.

"Well, see you there, Ames." Sonic gives Amy a quick peck on the cheek and then he makes his way towards the exit. She watches him leave until he's completely out of sight for her.

Amy resumes gathering her things in her bag and organizing her textbooks and supplies inside her locker. Afterwards, she closes her locker and—she gets startled when she sees the five girls, already standing right next to her and she didn't even noticed.

"Oh, it's you," Amy says.

The cheerleader chipmunk steps a little closer to the hedgehog whilst keeping that irritated look on her face. "So, Amy," she begins, "having fun stealing other guys away from girls?" Behind her, the others are doing the same. They're like cronies to the leader.

"Huh, what are you talking about?" Clearly, this is all a misunderstanding.

"You know what I'm talking about. You've recently stole my man. And you managed to do the same to my friends here. We all saw it. What do you have to say about that, 'Miss Perfect'?" Sally spat the last word on her face.

Amy sighs, "Look, you need to understand that they're just being playful and friendly to me, nothing big. And for your information, I'm not even perfect. I may be smart and artistic, but I'm definitely not perfect."

"Playful and friendly, huh?" Fiona remarks.

"I don't know what else to say, alright? Now, if you don't mind, I have somewhere important to be."

Amy takes off, but on her way out, Fiona intentionally made her trip; she grins maliciously at the action. When they just saw her stumble a bit, her bag opens loose—and something falls out and drops onto the tiled floor.

All five sees the object; it's a clear plastic bag and it jingles as it hits the floor. Inside the bag, the items are individually small, grey, metallic, and each have sharp edges on the sides. With a closer inspection—only a couple of them have tiny red marks.

They are wide-eyed in perplexity. Amy panicked a bit and she quickly takes the bag back into her hands and then hurriedly stuffs it back into her messenger bag. She looks at them.

"You didn't see anything," she tells them. Finally, she scurries away from the group.

Sally, Rouge, Fiona, Blaze, and Mina all watch her leave. What now catches their eyes—is that Amy Rose, the 'perfect' hedgehog, is hiding something—really drastically.


	3. Hide and Seek

**Author's Note: Almost forgot, this story has some Angst in it as well and this chapter happens to be very deep since it mentions Anorexia/Bulimia and Self-Injury.**

**Also, I do know about the animosity between Sonic and Scourge in the canon-world, but for this one, let's just say that they declared a truce and they decided to end their antagonism right before the story happened.**

* * *

Hide and Seek

School is done for the day and Sonic's football practice went well. As she promised, Amy made it there; she was sitting at the bleachers and watched the jock hedgehog perform. Sonic was really focused and powerful on his endurance and on the other hand, he was occasionally distracted by Amy cheering him on (and the way she shines under the sunlight), but he won't let his distraction interfere with his athletic abilities. Nevertheless, at least Sonic got the encouragement he deserves.

After the practice, both Sonic and Amy are on their way to a nearby pizzeria, where they will be meeting the rest of the guys. As the two hedgehogs walk into the doors of the pizza place, they start another tête-à-tête,

"Wow, Sonic, you were amazing back there!" Amy optimistically comments about the practice, "I never knew that you were that agile."

"Yeah, thanks." Sonic remarks, "I've been training a lot lately. They don't call me 'The Speed King' for nothing." He tosses his football up in the air and catches it.

She giggles at his arrogance, "And I know I shouldn't be laughing at this, but I kind of find it funny how one of your teammates was hit in face with the ball and he nearly got out cold."

Sonic returns the laugh, "It's true. Jet really needs to learn how to keep his eye on the ball. And Knuckles sure can tackle down anyone; it's great to have him in the team."

After the talk, the two find the rest of the group already sitting at the booth (that can fit for six people), waiting for them to come. Scourge is texting, Manic is drumming onto the table with his drumsticks, Silver is reading a book, and Shadow is listening to heavy metal music in his headphones.

"Hey, guys," Sonic greeted them. The four stopped what they were doing and gazes at the pink and blue hedgehogs.

"Hey, bro! How's practice?" Manic cheerily asks while Sonic is putting his ball away into his backpack.

"It was great," he remarks as he and Amy sit in the booth together, with Amy sitting in between Scourge and Sonic, "thanks for asking."

"Hey, everyone," Amy begins, "thanks for inviting me over. I could use some socialization after the first day." She takes her bag off her shoulder to set it behind her.

"Don't mention it, Rose," Scourge smirks at her.

Soon, Sonic removes his varsity jacket; Amy sees this as he sets it behind his back. Due to the warming heat inside the pizzeria, she wanted to remove her own jacket—but she can't reveal her entire arms. Instead, she just pulls down the top part, so that only her shoulders are showing and the sleeves are just covering her forearms. It looks appealing to the guys, though it feels somewhat uncomfortable albeit it's the only way to keep herself cool—only for her.

"Amy, don't you want to take your jacket off?" Silver asks her, "It's pretty warm in here, you know."

She tries to come up with an excuse. Impulsively, she says, "No, thanks. I'm good. I'm kind of used to the heat anyway." She attempts to let out a smile after a little lie.

Sonic then changes the subject, "So, did you guys order yet?"

Shadow answers, "Yup, but we weren't sure what kind of toppings Rose likes, so we ordered a large, half meat and half plain." He looks at Amy, "is that okay?"

"Yes," she instantly answers, "plain's fine for me. I don't like toppings anyway." Inexplicably, anxiety is starting to build up inside Amy. Without letting the others know, she's trying her best to ease herself down—or else.

She fixes her eyes on the jock, "So, Sonic," he gazes at her back, "I don't mean to take this personally, but," she pauses for a quick second, "how did you and Sally break up? You don't have to answer if you don't want to."

"Actually, I do," Sonic replies, "I broke up with Sally because I realized that it's not going to work out between us two, so I told her that I think it's better off if we see other people. And besides, ever since she joined the cheerleading squad, she suddenly turned into a demanding—bitch."

Amy is surprised. "Really?"

"Yeah, I would never date anyone who would change from an angel to a devil. But I'm not alone," he grins and points out to the others, "they had girl troubles before too."

She looks at them and they nodded, "What happened?"

"Fiona was my girlfriend before but I caught her cheating on me and then she wrecked my good motorcycle," Scourge says.

"Rouge is a narcissistic stalker who wouldn't leave me alone," Shadow stated.

"Mina has a crush on me and she is annoying the hell out of me," Manic says.

"And I like Blaze and all," Silver notifies, "but her infatuation for me is getting on my nerves."

This came to realization for Amy. "Seriously? Then, she quietly tells herself, "So that explains the coldness I've been getting from them."

"What?" Scourge asks.

"Nothing," she instantly answers.

"You said something about them giving you the cold shoulder," Sonic informs, "are the girls bothering you, Ames?"

"If they are," Shadow finishes off, "we can help you—"

"No, that's okay," she cuts him off, "I don't need that much help, really. I can save myself. I appreciate the offer though."

Right after their conversation, one of the servers shows up with their pizza. He sets it onto their table in the very center and then, he disperses.

"Oh, good, it's here!" Manic shouts out. He, along with the others, takes their first slices.

"Oh, finally, I'm starving!" Sonic shouts out as well before he takes his own piece.

Amy is the last to take hers; her anxiety is rising again and it's averting her from eating. She slowly takes a plain slice and only little by little, she takes her time consuming her pizza.

_10 minutes later…_

"And then I yelled out, 'Bro! Heads up!' and I threw it right into his face and he totally got knocked out in seconds, right onto the field!" Sonic exclaims with a haughty laugh and he even demonstrates with an imaginary ball in his hand. Everyone in the table is laughing at his story. He persists, "I swear to God, he was like seeing stars or something!"

"No way!" Manic responses.

The entire group is still laughing, but not everyone. Amy apparently is being distracted by something else. She's gazing at something down underneath the tabletop.

"And Amy saw the whole thing," Sonic points to the female, "right, Ames?"

"Huh?" she snaps back into reality, "Oh, yeah. I did. That was pretty uproarious." And then she fakes a laugh.

"Feeling okay?" he asks her as he's attempting to hold back his laughter.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Then, Amy gets up while holding onto her bag, "will you guys excuse me for a moment? I need to use the girls' room."

"Sure thing," Sonic scoots aside, so he can let her pass.

With Amy out of the way, she walks straight to the restrooms and she can still hear them having a conversation, loud enough for the entire pizzeria to hear.

"You know," she heard Manic beginning, "this reminds me of something back in the school's band room…"

The conversation fades away as Amy enters the women's restroom. The voices and laughter are still being heard, but the tone is fainted behind the closed door.

The female strolls up to the sinks; she sets her messenger bag down onto the floor, and then she looks at herself in the mirror. Her facial expression is completely different from before. Instead of her usual cheerful smile—she has a gloomy frown, along with her eyebrows furrowing in melancholy.

Still looking at her reflection, Amy takes off her jacket and sets it on top of her bag. With the sleeves completely off, both of her wrists and forearms reveal—self-inflicted scars. Most of them are completely red and discolored.

She looks back earlier today when she ran into Sally and the girls,

"…_I don't mean to ask you this, but may I ask what happened to your wrist?"_

"_Oh, I just got into an accident…"_

_Accident… accident…_

The word echoes inside her head as she stares at her marks. In reality, every time whenever Amy feels stressed, depressed, emotionally hurt, or even anxious—she would relief herself by self-mutilation. She keeps a little plastic bag of razor blades inside her messenger—just like the one that was fallen onto the floor right in front of the girls—in case she needed them. She's meticulous enough to make sure that no one in the school would know that she brings them to the building; otherwise, she may undergo serious consequences. Amy is also forced to make up some lies whenever people ask her what was wrong with her skin. The more lies she tells, the worst she becomes.

It's not just that. While still looking at the mirror, Amy elevates her top up a bit to reveal her midriff. After all that pizza she just ate, she's beginning to feel—guilty. She examines her own stomach by feeling down and around the abdomen. Despite that she's already slender—something doesn't feel right to her.

"My God," Amy whispers to herself as the pressure kicks in.

Quickly taking her bag and jacket with her, she runs into one of the stalls and then locks herself in, setting her things aside onto the floor. She gets down on her knees with her head near the toilet bowl. Amy then jams two of her fingers down her throat—and she vomits right into the toilet.

The sounds of gagging and retching are audible, but at least she's alone in the bathroom. She repeats the process until she feels like nothing is inside of her anymore. Unfortunately, the pain is unbearable for her to handle, both emotionally and physically. Emotionally, all of the self-pressure she's having is killing her; and physically, she's suffering severe weakness and abdominal pain.

A couple of minutes after purging, Amy moves away from the toilet and she leans her back against the stall-door. Normally, she would fast or starve on prolonged times or eat only very limited amounts of foods. At times, albeit not every often, Amy would start binge eating and afterwards, she'd self-induce vomit.

Sadly, the guilt, shame, and anxiety are still persistent. She can't handle the pressure to stay thin and she doesn't even know how long she will have to keep wearing the mask of lies—she's forced to fake her happiness when in reality, she's miserable.

Suddenly, Amy goes into her bag and she digs through inside to look for something. She already took out her bag of razors; she opens it and then takes out a clean one. After that—Amy places the sharp object onto her left wrist…

One minute later, she comes out of the stall with her bag over her shoulder, her jacket in her arm, and a large handful of toilet paper in her right hand as it compresses onto her left to stop the bleeding. Amy hurriedly runs back to the sinks. She discards the now-blood-stained toilet paper into the garbage bin. Then, she turns on the faucet in one of the sinks.

When her freshly-cut wrist is underneath the warm running water and blood is being rinsed away, Amy hears a male voice calling out from the outside of the women's restroom. He knocked on the door and asks,

"Amy, are you okay over there?" It's one of the guys, but she can't tell who it is behind the closed door.

"I'm fine!" is all she can answer. She lies again, "Sorry, I had an upset stomach. I'll be out soon!" She can hear him walking away; she sighs in relief and resumes her quick treatment.

Amy uses the foamy soap from the soap dispenser and washes the cut before she rinses her wrist. As soon as the blood is completely gone, the pink hedgehog dries it off with paper towels from the dispenser. She then takes out a tube of antibacterial cream from her messenger bag and quickly applies it before she exits out of the restroom. Amy steps out of the doorway and puts her jacket back on, so that no one can see her cuts and scars.

On her way back to the booth, she can still see that the guys are still there, waiting for her before they leave. Although, Sonic, Manic, Silver and Shadow seems to be covering Scourge as he is doing something.

Amy stood closer to them and she begins, "Sorry I took so long," and then she lets out a 'smile'.

"It's no big deal," Sonic says.

With a closer look, she sees Scourge behind their backs and he's laughing inaudibly. In his hands are two plastic bags filled with two different spices, one that is garlic powder and the other chili flakes. Another hint is that the two spice shakers on the table are completely opened.

"What are you doing?" she asks with a chuckle, thinking that this might be some kind of prank they're pulling on the servers.

"He's stealing some spices," Shadow says in a quiet tone while snickering, "and we're covering for him. Don't tell anyone."

"Why?" she asks again.

Scourge answers while screwing the lids back onto their appropriate shakers, "Because I like to add some spiciness on my foods and they're free here, one for every table. So why not take some home instead of spending five bucks on chili flakes from the store?" The rebel hedgehog stuffs his bags of stolen seasonings in his jacket pockets.

"He's also a cheapskate," Silver tells Amy. She responds with a giggle.

"Alright, let's go." Scourge says as he gets up.

"All done?" Sonic asks and he nods. "Ok, let's get the hell out of here."

Everyone gathers their own belongings. Soon, all six head out to the door.

Shadow, Silver, and Scourge exchanged goodbyes to one another as they head to their own separate directions. This leaves Amy alone with Sonic and Manic. The two brothers decide to walk her home since they live several blocks away from her.

"Now, that was pretty fun, wasn't it?" Manic comments.

"We should do this every Friday after school." Sonic responds. "What do you think, Ames?" he looks at her.

"I'll think about it," Amy replies after a second of silence.

While walking behind them, about two inches apart, Amy looks down on the ground, attempting to hide away her pessimism. Some irrational thoughts are coming back to her, regarding to her eating disorder and self-injury.

She knows that she cannot keep playing hide and seek every day whenever she's around with her friends.

One day… they're going to know her true self…

Somehow.


	4. I Spy

I Spy

Today is everyone's least favorite day: Monday. Before first period class starts, Sally Acorn and her friends are standing at their usual spot by the lockers.

"I may be grounded for life, but I don't even give a flying shit about it. It was worth it," Fiona finishes her story.

"Um, you do know that you can get arrested for stealing a pack of cigarettes from a convenience store, right?" Blaze informs her, "Especially when you're underage."

"And also," Rouge finishes off for her, "you could be under surveillance."

Fiona scoffs, "Not if you know how to get away with it… the right way." She grins maliciously. This scares Blaze, Mina, and Rouge, but they decide to go with it anyway.

"Ok, Sally's turn," Mina says and everyone glances at the leader. "Sally, what did you do this weekend?"

Sally seems disappointed about something. "Well, I went shopping yesterday, so I can at least find something new to impress Sonic and win him back from that slut. There was a sale going on at Eternity21 and I happened to come by the sexiest top I've ever seen! I wanted to get it in my size, but when I asked the lady about it, she just told me that they just sold the last small!" She growls and then stomps onto the floor in frustration.

"Aw, that sucks," Mina responds to it. "But I'm pretty sure that there will be a new shipment somewhere in the future."

"Besides, why can't you get one in medium?" Rouge asks.

Sally continues, "Yeah, right. Like I'll look good in a top that is one size bigger than me. It'll take like months until they come back to the store, and by the time I get it, the style will be over." Then, the chipmunk takes out her phone and goes through her photos. "Here, I took a pic of it, I want to show you what it looks like."

She shows them a photo of the shirt she heavily indulges. It's black and it kind of looks like a tank top but with sleeves; what's unique about the article of clothing is that the sleeves are entirely made of transparent dark-grey fabric—so see-through that the arms would look tinted if it is worn.

Mina, Fiona, Blaze and Rouge looked so stunned by the design, even the fashionista bat would want one for herself. Although, they feel bad for Sally, that she's too late to purchase one. Sally shuts off her phone and puts it away.

"And I swear," she continues with a disdained snarl, "if I ever find the bitch who bought the last small before me, I am going to—" she gets cut off when the sounds of awestruck compliments are being heard.

"Oh, my God, that top looks so amazing on you, Amy!" a female student is being heard. The five girls turn and walk to where the commotion is happening. When they found whom they were looking for, they can't believe their eyes.

"I swear to God, you have such an amazing taste in fashion. You're even more stylish than Sally Acorn or Rouge the Bat." The girl who just complimented was Tikal the eco-friendly Echidna and she's holding hands with her jock boyfriend, Knuckles, who is wearing his varsity jacket. Along with them, there's Cream the preppy Rabbit and her boyfriend Tails the intelligent-mechanic Fox. All four of them are standing around, complimenting at once and talking to Amy Rose.

To make matters worse for Sally—Amy is wearing the exact same shirt that Sally's been dying to get. As for the accessories to go with it, Amy is wearing a black leather-studded bracelet on her left wrist and a black dog collar around her neck. She's also wearing dark-blue skinny jeans, another pair of black combat boots (that is differently designed from her previous pair), and a grey shoulder bag. Sally lets out a shocking gasp as she sees the pink hedgehog showing her two best friends her new look.

"I know, thank you so much," Amy responds to Tikal's comment, "I just went shopping yesterday and I got this shirt on sale at Eternity21. I still can't believe that I got the last one in my size! I was so lucky that I got there before all of the small ones are sold out." She giggles.

The five are eavesdropping on the Rose again, even Sally; she's starting to lose control of herself when she just found out that it was Amy who bought the shirt before her.

"Looks like the new girl beat us again," Blaze says in a hushed tone. They persist glaring at her.

"You know," Tails begins with a smug on his face, "since the Hedgehogs 5x are all single, you can use that to get their attention." He grins mischievously.

"You still like Sonic, don't you?" Knuckles playfully picks on her and Amy blushes. "It's your chance to win him now." He smirks.

"Well, I don't know," she trails off in embarrassment, "I kind of like Silver, Scourge, Manic, and Shadow, too. So, I'm a bit torn now." This angered the five even more. Their faces are now green with jealousy.

Cream instantly changes the subject. "Amy, I have to be honest with you. You seriously have the most perfect body that I've ever seen!"

"Yeah! What is your secret?" Tikal asks her.

"My secret?" Amy remarks.

"How did you end up so—beautifully and perfectly thin?" Cream finishes the question for Tikal.

With modesty, the Rose answers, "Oh, it's no secret. I just—" she pauses for a moment, "Happen to have a healthy diet, that's all. You know what they say, you don't have to eat less, you just have to eat right." She laughs nervously. Some thoughts came up to her, reminding her that she mustn't let anyone know about her real secrets.

At that moment, the bell suddenly rings for first period.

"That's the bell," Amy says, "see you guys, around." She then exchanged goodbyes to the four right before they head off to their separate ways until they meet again.

With that done, Amy faces to a different direction and heads off to class. Sally and the gang immediately step away from her and then they hide themselves behind the corner of the hallway, just to make sure that she doesn't see them. Otherwise, Amy may think that they're some kind of creepy stalkers.

"Bitch," Fiona silently whispers when they just saw her passing by.

Amy heard the voice; inquisitively, she stops walking for a moment to see where it was coming from. She looks back and glances around, oblivious enough that she's being spied on.

"Hm," she says. Thinking she's just hearing things, Amy manages to shrug it off. She faces back to her direction and resumes strolling to her English class.

As soon as Amy is out of sight for them, all five came out of the corner and Sally lightly slaps Fiona in the back of the head.

"Nice going, she nearly caught us," she says dryly at the rebellious fox.

"So it's official," Blaze commences, "Amy Rose is perfectly flawless. She has everything what a man needs." Everyone groans to that statement.

"Now what are we going to do?" Mina asks the leader, "How are we supposed to compete with that?"

"There has to be some kind of flaws for Amy. I mean, no girl can be that smart, stylish, and popular all at once." Rouge says.

All of a sudden, an idea has flashed inside Sally's head. "Maybe there is," she responds with a malice smirk on her face.

"Huh?" they simultaneously ask in perplexity.

Sally continues, "Think about it. Don't you guys remember the other day when she walked into the school? She did have some things that she's been hiding from everyone else." This came to an understanding.

"Oh yeah," Fiona remarks, "Like that time when I tripped her and that—thing fell off from her bag. But what was that anyway? Looks kind of painful to be carrying that around you."

"According to my research," Blaze answers, "I assumed that those are some sort of blades."

Mina's eyes widened, "Seriously? Why would she carry those? Most importantly, how the hell did she kept them in school without ever getting caught?"

The intelligent cat shrugs, "If only I knew."

Sally interrupts them, "Ok, enough with that. There's something else about her that we should know." Just then, the second warning bell rings. Everyone sighs.

"Looks like we're going to have to put this on hold until the next time we meet again." Sally says. Her followers nodded in agreement. "But don't worry; I'll come up with something. In the meantime, just make sure that Amy Rose stays away from the guys, okay?"

"We really should get going, otherwise, we might get our asses kicked for staying in the hallways during class." Blaze informs as she carries her bag, "I'm not looking forward to have this in my permanent record."

"That's the risk I'm willing to take," Fiona remarks with a smile.

Soon afterwards, all five disperses into their own separate directions.

* * *

Hours later and it's time for Amy's free period. Instead of going to the library, she decides to go to the cafeteria, just to see what it's like over there. Before she goes to the lunch room, Amy has to go to her locker for a moment. On her way there, she's unaware that she's being watched by Sally as they exit out of the classroom. It seems that the two are in the same Trigonometry class together.

Sally quickly makes her way to her locker, which is where she will be meeting the rest of her friends/cronies, right before Amy catches them. There, she sees Fiona, Mina, and Rouge standing there, waiting for her.

"Hey, guys," Sally begins. She looks at them and she notices that they're missing one, "Where's Blaze?"

"She has something important to do," Mina informs, "and she said she can't really make it."

"Did you come up with anything on how to get rid of Rose?" Fiona asks.

"Sadly, no," she answers, "I really hate to admit this, but this girl is unbeatable. I have her in Trig and it's hard for me to come up with a plan with her acting like some sort of a mental calculator."

"Mental calculator?" Rouge asks.

Sally sighs. "She can literally answer a math problem under seconds—without making any mistakes AND without using a damn calculator."

Fiona groans, "Oh great, just what we need. More brains."

"I know! It's seriously getting on my freaking nerves!" the chipmunk concludes.

At that moment, Amy shows up and she passes by them; she has a pair of headphones on and she's listening to music. She's also humming and singing along the lyrics and the song she's currently listening to is 'Teenage Dream' by Katy Perry.

The four watches her as Amy sings the verses and chorus of the song quietly to herself while undoing her locker (that happens to be nearby Sally's). She opens it and minding her business, Amy is getting her books out of her bag and she transfers them into her little storage. She sees her assigned book for her English class and she decides to take that with her, so she could do some reading during lunch period.

With everything done, Amy closes her locker and she runs into the group—yet again. She stops her singing.

"Oh, hey," Amy begins as she pauses her music player in her phone and then hangs her headphones around her neck. "How's everything?" She says innocently. She thought that if she played nice to the girls, they wouldn't give her the cold shoulder anymore.

"Don't 'how's everything?' us," Sally begins with coldness and then she crosses her arms while glaring at her eye to eye. Unfortunately, playing nice isn't really working for the Rose.

"Huh?" she replies. Suddenly, Mina, Fiona, and Rouge surround the hedgehog; to make sure that she doesn't escape from them. If only Blaze was there, Amy'd be completely locked down.

"We know exactly what's been going on with you. You've been faking everything just to get attention," Sally persists, "Care to tell us the whole fucking truth about yourself?"

"What are you talking about?" Amy raises her eyebrow.

"Don't play shit, we knew all along that you have been—" Once again, Sally gets cut off by someone else.

"Special delivery for Amy Rose!" Knuckles happily shouts out as he inexplicably appeared out of nowhere; he's standing behind Sally. Everyone looks at the jock echidna. He's holding a bouquet of roses that is beautifully wrapped in transparent pink rolling paper and is tied with a red ribbon.

Amy steps closer to Knuckles; now, the group is standing behind her. He hands her the bouquet and she takes it into her hands.

"Oh, is it really for me?" Amy says, feeling stunned. With a closer look at the bouquet, all of the flowers are roses; they're only five of them and each rose are in different colors: Red with a Black lining, Light Green, Blue, Dark Green, and White. Amy gasps at the beauty and she immediately took a hint of what each color represents.

"Yep," Knuckles answers, "they're all from Shadow, Manic, Sonic, Scourge and Silver. It's really a gift from them and they told me to deliver it to you."

She looks at the tag that is attached onto the ribbon. It simply says, _'To Our Favorite Rose: Amy. Love…'_ and then all of their names are signed underneath.

"Aw, that's really thoughtful of them. And they exactly know my favorite flower." Amy takes a whiff of the roses and she carefully snuggles it into her arms.

"And there's more," he continues, "They also told me that they have more surprises in store for you in the cafeteria, and they want you to go there right away." Then, Knuckles clicks his tongue before he turns around. "See ya, Amy." Finally, he walks away.

Amy turns back to the girls. They're completely paralyzed in disdain and envious. "Sorry, everyone, I have to get going," and soon, she left them, quickly making her way to the cafeteria.

As soon as she left, Blaze the Cat suddenly appears to them. She tells them, "Hi. Sorry I'm late. I know I said I wouldn't make it, but I—," she notices something isn't right for them; they gaze at her with their still-disdained facial expressions.

"Did I miss something?" she asks.

"Yes, you did," Mina answers her, "Our men just gave her flowers as a gift! Including your Silver!"

Blaze gasps. "No,"

"Yeah, it's official," the mongoose continues, "she won."

There's silence for a mere minute.

"So, now what, Sal?" Rouge asks.

Sally answers with a serious look on her façade and she makes eye contact with them, "We're not going to give up that easily because deep down, there are some heavy flaws in every person, including Miss Perfect. And if we want to go deeper, it looks like we're going to have to take some drastic measures."

Rouge cuts in, "But you do know that we can't keep spying on her. The more we do that, she'll become more suspicious."

"Exactly, Rouge."

Fiona interrupts, "Then, how are we—"

"Don't worry, Fi," then, Sally lets out another malice smirk, "I know just the right person for this job and she happens to be a natural at this kind of stuff."

Then, Sally takes out her phone and dials a number.

_With Amy…_

Amy sets foot into the cafeteria and then glances around. All over the room, there are students walking around from counter to table to table and it's filled with loud voices from all that incoherent chattering, even though Amy still has her headphones on; the music she's listening to are muffling the sounds of the raucous students. She can also smell the delicious cafeteria food, but alas, the self-pressure is averting her.

"I wonder where they are," Amy says to herself while searching for the five hedgehogs that they said they'd be here.

After a second of looking around and still seeing no sign from any of them, she decides to go to the vending machines to buy a quick snack for herself. From two different machines, one beverage and one snack, Amy purchased a bottle of fruit water and a bag of pretzels. She took a quick look at the number of calories on the food label before she puts the pretzels into her bag to save for later. Afterwards, she walks to an empty rounded table with her water and her flowers still in her arms.

With that said, the pink hedgehog sets the roses and her bag on top of the table and then she pulls out a chair to sit. Taking a sip from her fruit-flavored water, Amy takes her book out to read while waiting.

After reading several pages for a few minutes, Amy has a strange feeling that she's being watched; the feeling when somebody is behind her and he's suddenly sneaking around, while he's seemingly checking her out.

"Hm?" she squeaks.

Instantly, and out of the blue—the Hedgehogs 5x pop up and leant themselves against the table, all giving her eye contact (and it sure was a surprise). It startled the female a little, and it also feels kind of awkward for her.

"Hey," the guys say inarticulately.

"Oh, hey," Amy replies as she turns off her music player, closes her book, and then hangs her headphones around her neck.

"Did you like the gift we gave you, Ames?" Sonic says while looking at the bouquet in front of them.

"Yeah, I love it so much," she strokes the ribbon, "How did you guys know I love roses?"

"It was a lucky guess," Scourge answers.

"And they sure remind us of you," Shadow finishes, "a lot."

This warms Amy's heart, "Aw, you guys are so—" she gazes at the flowers for a second and then back to them; it's the colors of the roses that catches her eye, "symbolic."

It's Manic turn to speak, "We were going to find a pink one to go with it, but sorry to say, it's too rare."

Silver finishes it for him, "However, it turns out that it does have a pink rose all along—it's you."

They all smile.

"By the way, I believe that Knuckles told me that you have more surprises for me. Is that true?" Amy says.

"Yes, we do." Sonic persists. "We were going to ask Knux if he can bring these to you along with the flowers, but I decide that it's best if we save these for the last."

"You?" Shadow, Silver, Manic and Scourge all said in unison to the jock.

"Ok, I meant 'we'," he answers honestly.

Amy chuckles, "Well, what is it?"

Silver takes out a large shopping bag from underneath the table and then sets it on the tabletop. Then, he takes out one present.

"We also got you some sweets," he pulls out a plastic container that holds a dozen mini cupcakes; all golden and have pink frosting. The tiny little pastries are indulging for Amy. Silver continues, "I told them that we should give you cupcakes instead of chocolates. To me, it sounded cliché."

"Wow, that looks so delicious," she comments as she stares at the mini cakes. She has the impulse to take a piece but—she averts herself from doing so.

"And," Manic pulls the bag closer to him and he stuck his hand inside, "you're going to like this, Amy. We also got you…" Swiftly, he pulls out a stuffed panda bear with big beady eyes, "Panny the Panda!"

Instantly, the female gasps affectionately. "Aww!" she coos at its adorableness; she couldn't resist the cuteness. She takes the bear into her hands and she snuggles it into her warmth, "She's so cute! I love her!"

Manic, arrogantly, looks at Scourge and Shadow. He whispers to the two, "I told you guys that she'd like the panda better than the elephant and the giraffe."

Shadow replies, "Ok, you win."

Scourge remarks, "Still, elephants can be lovable, too."

Amy makes eye contact with all five of them, "Thank you so much, everyone. You guys are truly the best." She's about to shed tears of joy due to the compassion and charity that they have done for her. She manages to hold back the tears. They looked at her, more sincerely than ever.

Sonic commences, "We just want to do something very special to a girl like you and we think that you deserve the best on your early days at Chaos High."

It is a really touching moment for the Rose. Suddenly, Amy checks out the time on her phone.

"Hey, before lunchtime is over," she asks them, "think you five can walk me to my locker and help me carry them back?"

Of course, they cannot say no to her. They immediately accept.

"Great," Amy stood up from the chair, "Let's go."

Everyone assembles all of their belongings and they all together walk out of the table. Unbeknownst to any of the six hedgehogs—they're being surveillance by someone.

A Mobian, with a very petite feminine body type, happens to be sitting at the table behind them and she has been watching this whole time. She lifts her head up from an opened textbook that she uses to pretend to read during her observation. It's unknown who this Mobian is; her identity is completely hidden underneath a black hoodie and the hood over her head covers her eyes entirely. She's also wearing dark jeans and a pair of black and white sneakers, along with her magenta backpack with a black skull print.

During the hedgehogs' private meeting, the mystery Mobian has been writing down notes and taking perfect shots of them (with the flash and camera shutter off). She's still watching the six as they all step out of the double doors of the cafeteria.

Soon, the mystery girl gathers all of her personal belongings. She continues to go undercover while following them as she, too, exits the lunchroom.

Out in the hallways, she hides herself around the corner and observes the hedgehogs standing by Amy's locker; the boys were helping her store her items into her storage and the girl can see them laughing and talking all at once. There are also some hints of romance between the six.

That's just the beginning:

The mystery girl proceeds her agenda throughout the rest of the school day until dismissal. She went into extremes by literally watching every move Amy makes. Heck, she even hacked into the Rose's locker and took some more pictures in there, including her gifts from the guys. She even secretly recorded each of the male hedgehogs' private conversations on her notebook and most of them pertains to their infatuation—for Amy.

Even worse—she has already went too far when she followed Amy into one of the girls' bathroom. Without ever getting herself caught, the mystery girl has found out about Amy's two biggest revelations.

Getting enough evidence on the Hedgehogs 5x and Amy Rose, the hooded female Mobian scurries her way into the library as soon as the students leave for dismissal. There, on one of the tables, she finds whom she's looking for: Sally, Fiona, Mina, Rouge and Blaze. She makes her way to them; it seems that she works for the five as well. She then sets her backpack on the table right in front of her.

Sally lets out a smirk while twirling her pen into her fingers, "Did you get the stuff?" she asks the spy.

"Yup, like you said," the girl answers as she takes out all of her notes from her backpack for them to see. She takes her phone out and shows them every photo of evidence she has taken.

The five girls begin to scroll through everything… and most of them are too shocking for them to know. Albeit, some of them are perfect for them to use—to get their revenge.

They glance back at their spy.

"You did such an excellent job. Now, we have just about everything we need to teach Amy Rose a lesson," Sally chuckles malevolently. "Thank you again… Rosy."

After saying her name, the girl unveils her hood, revealing herself as—Rosy the Rascal.

She is a hedgehog too and she has the same resemblance as Amy; both have pink fur and they even have the same green eye color. The only major distinction is that Rosy's quills are styled in a different way; her back quills are in three spikes, just like Sonic's and Scourge's except they're more downward and longer, while her chin-length front quills are covering one of her eyes, like fringes.

Rosy lets out a crooked smile, "No problem," she replies to the leader.


	5. Lose Control

**Author's Note: Before reading this, I just want to say that I am deeply getting fed up with all of these hateful reviews I've been receiving. Recently, I just got into a car accident not too long ago, so please don't even start. Speaking of which, I'm sorry if the chapter is not that good because while I was writing, the injuries from the accident is averting me from concentrating.**

**So once again, PLEASE STOP WITH THE DRAMA IN MY REVIEW BOXES! That goes to the Haters too! Also, please do not retaliate with each other because that will make things worse.**

**Okay, enough with this. Read and Review.**

* * *

Lose Control

On the next day, Amy is sitting by a tree in the school's front yard, reading her Literature book. For today's outfit, she's wearing a long sleeved black shrug-sweater, a dark pink shirt, jeans, and a pair of magenta-velvet ankle boots. Even her quills are styled differently today; it's tied into a ponytail and strands of her front quills are hanging loose.

While Amy is reading her book, she couldn't help but to feel some touching moments during the plotlines.

"Aw, I feel sorry for Catherine," she comments to herself.

Just when she turns a page, a large shadow has formed in front of her, blocking her sunlight.

"Hello again, Amy," Amy looks up and she sees Sally and her crew, glaring at her. Fear is beginning to increase for the innocent hedgehog. Sally continues, "Enjoying reading under the shade, I see."

Amy places a bookmark on her current page before she closes it. She looks at the cover. "Yeah, I really like how the themes in this literature piece focus on both infatuation and revenge. This is really for my English class. Have you—"

Sally and Fiona look already bored with her brief summary, but unbeknownst, Blaze seems intrigued.

"Yeah, yeah, we get it," Fiona cuts in, offending the Rose. "Enough with that. We actually have something for you."

Putting her book away into her black-and-pink bag, Amy carefully stood up from the grass as she hangs her bag over her shoulder.

"Oh, really?" she responds with a raised eyebrow in suspicion.

"Of course," Fiona gestures to Sally Acorn, "Tell her, Sal."

Sally persists, "Listen Amy honey. We felt really bad about how we have been behaving towards you lately ever since you first walked in to this school. And Kitty here is right," she points to Blaze, who is deeply offended by that nickname, "I do have some dislikes to new students. But, that's over now, and to make it up, we have a surprise for you." She smiles.

Feeling unreliable to her statement, Amy responds, "Really?"

"Yes, but you won't receive it until your lunch period, because it's not ready yet. We're still working on it, and to make sure, my friends here," Sally points to the bat, cat and mongoose, "Rouge, Blaze and Mina will come and pick you up and take you to the cafeteria. Isn't that right, girls?" the leader winks at the three.

In reluctance, the three positively responded.

Afterwards, Sally and Fiona gazes back at Amy. Fiona finishes off, "So, do we have a deal?" she smirks.

Amy takes a moment to think about it. She's not sure if it's really a trick or some kind of a serious apology. Then, she replies with a sigh, "Sure, I guess."

Sally folds her hands together, "Excellent. Well, that's all we have to say to you. See you around, Amy."

After the small talk, the five faces away from the Rose and they walk away together. She watches them stroll back inside the school's entrance.

"Huh, maybe this won't be so bad," Amy tells herself. She looks at the time.

With only fifteen minutes before the first bell rings, she immediately goes into the entrance to prepare herself for class.

Unlike the previous days—today feels different. As she strolls through the hallways, Amy notices something is strange going on towards to students. They're watching her—not like how they did when she first walked in, they're watching her like she has done something wrong—and they're whispering to one another behind her back.

"Oh, my God. It's her," one of the students, a female brown and ebony-haired lynx whispers to her friend, a blonde rabbit.

"Is that the one who…" the rabbit replies.

Amy has no idea what anyone is talking about. She tends to ignore the chattering and resumes her walk. Like any other students, she acts as if she couldn't hear them or as if she's nonchalant—for now.

Within yards away, Amy finally makes it to her locker. Unfortunately, while's she's undoing her lock and opening her storage, she still hears some whispering going on and it's starting to get aggravating. Apparently, ignoring is not working for her.

She begins to assemble her necessities for class. While doing so, a triad of students stood behind her, looking at her, and they remained persistent with the silent gossip. The three are all lynxes, two males and one female. One of the males stood closer to Amy, seemingly taking a glimpse at her façade—in a disturbing way.

Amy notices the feeling; she glances at the lynx trio with nuisance; she glares at the one who is staring at her and then she pulls herself away from him.

"What are you doing?!" she snaps at them.

The male backs off, "Crap," then, he turns to his friends, "I actually expected that she may have—" he gets cut off by the lynx female shushing him; she slightly smacks him in the upper arm.

"Don't say it in front of her, Jake," she urges him with a laugh.

"Say what?" Amy asks in confusion.

"Oh, nothing," the girl replies with a frivolous smirk. Afterwards, she leads her two friends out of the way. "Come on, guys," she informs them, "Let's leave before we catch something from her that we don't even want to know." The lynx triad let out a laugh as they leave the Rose.

Amy has never been this perplexed before. "What the hell are they talking about?"

At that moment, a purple swallow from earlier, named Wave, strolls by her.

"Hey, Amy." She greets her with obnoxiousness while still walking, "I heard that you're dating five guys at once. Don't even come near me or Jet—or else." Then, Wave coughs the word 'slut' before she's out of sight.

Now, the pink hedgehog is completely offended by the misunderstanding.

"What? But that's not even—"

"Amy!" a familiar feminine voice calls out as she runs to her. She turns to the direction and it's Tikal, looking urgent. The female orange echidna stood adjacent to her.

"Amy, there's something that you should see, and you're not going to like this," she informs while touching her arm.

"What is it? And can somebody please explain to me what's going on?"

"Just come with me to the computer lab," Tikal leads Amy to one of the school's computer rooms on the first floor.

When the two got there and entered through the doorway, Tikal points to Tails, Cream, and Knuckles all standing by the same monitor together; Tails is the one doing all the scrolling and typing. The two girls get closer to them.

"What's going on?" Amy asks the rest of the group. The preppy-girly bunny looks at her.

"Amy," Cream asks, "please tell me this isn't true."

"I don't even know what's going on," she replies with integrity.

Tails moves a little to the side while still on the office chair he's sitting on. He informs Amy, "There's this column on the school's website called 'Chaotic Chat'. It's where students anonymously post blogs, news, and even gossip around the school under their own aliases. It's very popular around here, but at the same time, it's extremely hurtful to those who have been mentioned and the staffs are trying their best to take the column down."

Amy asks again, "What's that have to do with—"

Knuckles instantly retorts as he points to the screen, "Someone by the name 'RascalBrat' has posted a gossip article—about you." Amy's heart is racing in anxiety.

Tails continues while showing her the article online, "Here, take a look."

Amy reads through the whole thing—and she can't believe her eyes.

The article read:

_Most of you may have known our student Amy Rose as the school's new favorite one of a kind sweetheart. Well, there's something that you may haven't heard about the new girl. It is said that she is… not one… not two… but a five-timer!_

_That's right, Team Chaotic Emeralds! Amy Rose aka "Miss Perfect" is dating five different guys all at once. The Five happen to be:_

_Our all-star athlete, Sonic T. Hedgehog_

_Straight-A honor student, Silver T. Hedgehog_

_Our very own rock-star, Manic, also the brother of Sonic_

_Shadow 'The Mysterious' Hedgehog_

_And Scourge, our Mr. Rebel._

_And to make matters worse in our own hands…_

_These five men already have their own sweethearts! Gasp!_

_Unbelievable you say? Talk about a Man-Stealer! Yikes._

_Even Amy said it herself that "she's in 'love' with all and the decision is 'tough' to make"._

_Questions remains: Is this really love or lust? Did she go all the way with each and every one of them? Also, is there a sixth we should know about?_

_You should think twice about each and every one of the new students because you may never know what they have been hiding._

_More evidence, coming soon._

For indication, there are photos of the six hedgehogs together. Most of them looked as if she is really dating all five.

Getting to the end, Amy is entirely shocked about this whole dilemma. She couldn't believe that a tiny misunderstanding can lead to a huge rumor. Just because she said she 'likes' them, doesn't really mean she's in love with them.

"No," she laments softly. "This can't be happening. It's not true at all."

Whilst the anxiety increases, Amy starts to repeatedly snap a rubber band, on her wrist, against her skin; she now has the urge to hurt herself.

The four notices her action, "Amy, are you okay?" Cream asks in concern.

She didn't answer for a moment. The sounds of the snapping rubber band are the only thing they hear from her.

"Amy?" Cream asks once more.

Finally, she stops and answers by impulse, "I'm sorry, guys. I have to go." Instantly, she exits out of the computer lab, leaving the four trustworthy friends completely worried about the Rose.

Knuckles broke the silence when he gazes at the rest, "Whoever this 'RascalBrat' is, he or she deserves a good punch in the face." They all nodded in agreement.

Back with Amy, while she's scurrying through the hallways in utter despair and pain until she runs into a nearby girls' bathroom…

Rosy can see her reaction as she leans against the wall, peaking over the corner. There's a black solemn look on her face, but it's quite unknown if she's feeling good or guilty. She has her phone in her hands and right on the screen shows a blog profile with the username—RascalBrat.

* * *

As time pass by, this day couldn't get any worse for Amy. Everywhere she goes, students accuse her for her 'promiscuity'. Even though she hasn't see any one of the Hedgehogs 5x today, she fears of they, too, have read the rumor online and she worries about their reactions.

Aside with all of this stress, Amy couldn't resist the urge to harm herself and the rubber band substitution isn't working anymore. Somewhere in between History and Trigonometry, she has already cut herself once. Fortunately for her, the school doesn't know about her self-injury online. At least that what she thinks.

It's lunchtime now and Amy remembers earlier this morning when Sally told her that three of her cronies will come pick her up. She stood outside by the doorway to wait and she uses her phone as a distraction while the rest of the class exits the classroom. She wonders why Sally couldn't just take her with her since they're previously in the same class. Presumably, she's still getting everything ready and making sure that everything is in order?

Just then, the pink hedgehog sees the three. They stood closer to her.

"Are you ready, Amy?" Rouge asks her.

"I guess," Amy meekly replies as she puts her phone away. Blaze carefully held onto Amy's right arm while Mina is on her left. Soon, they all head straight into the cafeteria.

A couple of minutes later, they made it to the double doors. Rouge glimpses through the door window and she sees Sally and Fiona doing some last minute touches. Afterwards, the bat glances back at the hedgehog.

"We'll wait outside," she tells her.

Soon, Amy walks straight through the doors, leaving them behind. The three suddenly watch her through the window when the doors closed. What they'll see—is something they'll regret for a long time.

Amy searches around the lunch area; the tension is starting to rise for she fears for the worse. All of a sudden, she spots Sally and Fiona standing by the table at the very end of the cafeteria. On the table top, there are a few courses. Taking a deep breath, Amy strolls to the two—unaware that something malevolent is going to happen to her.

The leader looks up to the Rose, with a seemingly innocent grin on her face, and Fiona did the same as well.

"Amy, I'm so glad that you finally made it, darling," Sally says. She pulls out a chair for her to sit, "Here, take a seat." She did as she is told and then she sets her bag beside the chair on the floor.

"So, Amy," Fiona resumes the conversation, "how's your day going so far?"

She lets out a melancholic frown when she answers, "Awful. I'm not sure if any of you heard, but there's this rumor going on around the school about me. Everyone hates me now and now they think that I'm a—" she cuts herself off, not wanting to say the word she despises so much. Amy carefully places her palms over her eyes to hide the morose.

Without letting her know, Sally and Fiona glance at each other, grinning malevolently.

"It's working," Fiona whispers to her. "And it's great to have Rosy to post that blog up." The chipmunk replies with a subtle nod.

They look back at Amy; Sally places her hand on her forearm, acting sympathetic. "Aw, don't worry." Amy then picks her head up and makes eye contact with the two. "I'm sure that it will die away soon enough. After all, rumors only last for like a day or two and after that, everyone will forget it all." Sally lies.

The little white lie has made Amy smile—just a little bit. She thinks that they decided to change their ways, from being naughty to nice. "Thanks."

Subsequently, Fiona shows Amy the courses on the table: a bowl of spaghetti, a plate of salad with vinaigrette dressing, some soda, and a box of store-brought chocolate cake. Aside with that, there are some paper plates and plastic utensils.

Fiona says, "Like we said earlier, this is the surprise we were telling you before. We wanted to have lunch with you."

"But what about Rouge, Mina, and Blaze?"

"Honestly, we don't know," Sally answers with a shrug, "but if they said they don't want to come, then it's their loss."

"So, it looks like it's just the three of us," The fox finishes.

Amy looks at the three course meal. She's slightly delighted at the sight, and no matter how hungry she is the self-pressure is telling her not to get near any of the food, despite how delicious it looks.

She also wonders, "How did you get all of this?"

Fiona lies, "We have our ways. Let's just say that we did some favors," she then winks at Sally. In reality, they actually stole the pasta and salad from the school's kitchen. It's unknown how they managed to get away with it.

Sally commences, "Shall we get started? Hope you're hungry, Amy."

"Well, actually," the nervous Rose answers, "I-I'm not feeling too hungry right now. Honest."

"What's wrong?" Sally mocks.

"Nothing's wrong," she lies again, "I just don't feel like eating, that's all."

Fiona joins in, "Come on, just one bite of each." Amy shook her head in decline.

This is where things are starting to get out of hand.

Sally is starting to become persuasive now. She glares at the hedgehog, "You know, we spent a lot of time preparing this lunch just for you as a token of being friends. Clearly, us two cannot really finish the entire dish ourselves, even with the others if they ever decide to show up. And now, you're letting it go to waste… all because you have no appetite?"

Amy sighs, "If I am, then I'm truly sorry, ok? You need to understand that—"

Fiona cuts her off again, "Understand what?" she snarls the last word. "Understand that—you worry you might get food somewhere inside of you… and make you look… fat?" she laughs more maliciously.

The Rose is entirely shocked. It's crystal clear that they knew something of her.

Meanwhile, the rest of Sally's cronies are still watching the whole thing through the door. They look away and make eye contact with one another. There's remorse in all three.

"Guys," Mina begins, "I really don't want to do this anymore. I really don't want to inflict pain on anyone, even if she did take our men."

"Me neither," Blaze replies, "What have we gotten ourselves into? We've let our jealousy get the best of us."

Rouge sighs, "I feel the same way as you, too. But you've heard what Sally said: if we refuse to help her, she will reveal our major secrets to the entire school. It's either this, or face the humiliation and pain." Blaze and Mina groans.

Suddenly, Tikal shows up. In her hands, she is carrying green bags of recycling.

"You guys are not trying to do anything that involves hurting Amy, are you?" The nature-loving echidna asks in concern.

"Uh, no." Mina replies.

"Good, because I really don't want to see her go through such heartache." Tikal resumes the talk, "You know, no one except for me, Knux, Tails and Cream know about this, but Amy has been going through a lot of difficulties throughout her life."

This caught their attention.

"Difficulties? What kind of difficulties?" Blaze asks.

"She'd rather not say much, but it was really painful for her. The poor girl has suffer a lot of abuse in the past and the more this happens, the worse she becomes." Tikal has given them a sympathetic facial expression.

"Abuse?" Mina repeats the word in fear.

"Unfortunately, yes," the echidna concludes. "And also, due to that false story about her that has been spread around the school, Amy went completely dishearten. She's really hurt badly and I just hope that Sally and Fiona won't do anything to worsen her pain. Otherwise—karma might strike." Finally, she turns around and walks away from them.

After hearing the informative speech from Tikal, they all glance at each other again, feeling more remorse. It has come to realization.

"What have we done?" They say together in total regret.

Back with the other three, Sally and Fiona are still persistent with their own abuse.

"Look," Amy laments, "I really can't talk about this. Can I please go?" she's about to leave the two, but Fiona stops her.

The fox glares at her, "Not until you tell us."

Sally joins in, "Just say the word and maybe we'll let you go."

Amy stammers meekly for a moment. "I'm not supposed to tell, it's too personal. You have to understand. Please, just let me go."

"Not even one word?"

Amy shook her head. Sally and Fiona make another malevolent eye contact.

The leader continues, "Well, then. I guess—we have no choice." She takes the spaghetti bowl while Fiona takes the salad in their hands. They then stood on both sides of Amy.

"Here, let us help feed you anyway." And then—together, Sally dumps the now-cold pasta all over Amy and Fiona spills the salad on top of her. The students in the entire lunchroom look at the action; many of them are aghast.

Amy is revolted, but it's not done yet. Sally takes the square cake out of its box; she smiles frivolously. "Don't forget dessert." Then, she shoves the cake to her face and chest.

With that, Fiona takes the soda and opens the cap. When the rest of the cake falls to the floor, she lifts the soft drink over Amy.

She, too, is grinning frivolously, "Let's wash that down for you." Finally, she pours the beverage all over her.

With everything done, Amy stood up from her seat, sweeping the food off her with her hands. She looks at them, "What are you doing?!" she cries out.

They gave her a harsh look, "This is what you get for stealing all of our guys." The fox growls at her.

"Sally! Fiona!" a voice calls out. There, they see Rouge, Mina, and Blaze running towards them, looking frantic.

"Call off the plan! This is going too far!" Blaze urges them.

"Too late," Fiona responds, "It's already done." The three sees the now-distressed hedgehog. They can see the sadness in her.

"Amy, look—" Mina tries to explain, but Amy instantly grabbed her bag and then ran away, sobbing. She exits through the double doors.

The cronies scolded. Sally glares at them, "Why are you three still standing here when you should be getting the next part done?"

"You all should be getting the guys." Fiona demands, "It's majorly important if they see—"

Rouge snaps back, "We want out!"

Blaze did the same, "What we're doing was wrong! Clearly, we're just making—"

Sally cuts her off in disdain, "Listen to me, remember the deal. If you're out, then Fi and I will have Rosy reveal your secrets to the entire school online."

"How would you feel if the school knows that we have," Fiona points to Rouge, "a compulsive thief," then she points to Blaze, "an academic cheater," and lastly Mina, "and a failed lip-syncing singer!"

They gasp and then there's silence.

"Well?" Sally demanded them. The followers glance at each other before they can answer.

With Amy, she's now in the girls' restroom, standing by the sinks and crying to the mirror. She has the water running and she's trying her best to get all the food off herself, but it's hard to do so. The miscellaneous smell of garlic, cake frosting, soda, and vinaigrette dressing is sickening her.

"Why me?" she laments as she washes through her quills, "Why does it always have to be me? What did I do wrong?"

Giving up after minutes of washing, Amy shuts off the faucet and then slams her hands against the edge of the sink. She continues to stare at herself in the mirror; she sees nothing but mayhem and sadness in the reflection.

Worst of all—the sounds of laughter are echoing inside her head. The pain and depression is kicking in. Now it's the time.

Amy rapidly goes through her bag to look for her—blades. But as she rummages through her things inside—they're not in sight! She already has dug through her bag twice, and they're still not present.

"No… where are they? I swore I had them sealed in there. How could they be gone?" Amy panicked. Her heart is racing.

"Oh, Amy," she hears someone calling her name in a sing-song tone. She quickly glances at the restroom door. It's Fiona and she's leaning against the doorway.

"Looking for—" the smirking rebel quickly takes out a bag of razor blades and shows it to her face. "This?!"

Amy gasps in distress. She must've taken it out from her bag back in the cafeteria when she isn't looking. "Give those back!" she shouts as she jumps closer to her.

The Rose tries to get the razors back from her, but Fiona kept it away from her.

"Please, give them back to me!" she pleads while trying to grab the plastic bag from her.

"You want them?" she asks maliciously. "Here, go get them!" She then throws them out in the hallway; the jingling sounds became audible and some even scattered over the floor.

Amy runs out of the bathroom to retrieve her blades. She got down on her knees and she finally got them back into her hands. She picked the fallen ones back up from the titled floor and reinserts them into the plastic bag.

"Amy?!" a male voice says her name in shock. She panics after hearing the familiar voice. She looks up and—it's Sonic. He's not alone; the rest of the Hedgehogs 5x are also there and they saw the sharp objects in her hands. They're pretty shocked as well. Along with them, there's Mina standing by Manic, Rouge is holding onto Shadow's arm, and Blaze is right next to Silver.

While getting up, a horrified Amy attempts to hide them in her messenger bag, but it's too late.

"Guys! I can explain!" she exclaims.

"Amy, why are you carrying razor blades?" Silver asks in concern.

The Rose is about to answer, "I—"

Sally, who happens to be standing by Sonic, interrupts her. "No need to tell, you've already showed enough." Then, the chipmunk stood right next to Amy. Fiona did the same also, but on the other side (Sally on her right and Fiona on her left).

"Sally, what is the meaning of this? And why's Amy like this?!" Sonic demands his ex-girlfriend.

"Fiona, what the hell is going on?!" Scourge did the same to his ex.

Both Sally and Fiona held onto Amy's arms, grasping her sleeves. The poor defenseless pink hedgehog is attempting to release herself from them. "Gentlemen," Sally commences, "prepare yourself to see the dark side of your so-called favorite Rose."

Lastly—they both yanked off the sleeves of her shrug sweater. Now, all of the ugly scars on her arms and wrists are revealing to the Hedgehogs 5x. The boys are even more appalled and the other three girls are feeling more repentance. Amy has her head down as everyone stares; she's emotionally paralyzed.

"Holy shit…" Manic says quietly while staring at the discolored marks.

"What happened, Rose?" Shadow asks.

Fiona instantly snarls, "Isn't it obvious?! She cuts! It's perfectly clear that this girl you're all falling for is insanely suicidal!"

There's a pause. Amy is finally released from the two's hold, though she's still numb. Tears begin to well up in her eyes and they glisten as they fall to the floor.

"Amy, is this true?" Sonic worriedly asks. She couldn't answer due to all of this pain.

"I'm sorry, everyone," Amy impulsively answers in despair. Right away, she grabs her things and then ran away from the group.

"Amy, wait! Come back!" Sonic calls out.

Everyone watches her leave until she's out of sight. Whilst everyone else is feeling apprehensive about her, Sally and Fiona are both smiling farcically at each other, knowing that their plan has worked.

The Hedgehogs 5x scolded at the two. Sally looks back at Sonic, who apparently is feeling disdain at their action.

"What the fuck did you do to her?" he growls.

"Honey, before I can explain, we're not the only ones." Sally retorts. She then points to the followers. "They were part of this, too."

This angers Shadow, Manic, and Silver. As they glare at them, they harshly pulled themselves away from Rouge, Mina, Blaze.

"What is wrong with you all?!" Shadow snaps at them.

"You were begrudging at first, and then you went into extremes to hurt a poor innocent new student?" Silver informs.

"Silver," Blaze remarks his statement, "It's not what you think. We were trying to stop them at first, but—"

"But what?"

She sighs as she quickly glances at Sally, "We can't say."

Mina persists, "But you were right, though. We were jealous at first, but we would never go that far into humiliating someone. I guess we didn't know until _they _decided to bring the plan up."

Manic raises his eyebrow, "Oh, really?"

Rouge pleads to Shadow, "And I may be conceited at times, but I would never hurt someone like that. I swear." The dark hedgehog didn't believe her.

"Listen, we're really sorry, okay?" Blaze concludes. "Will you forgive us?"

They gave the guys time to think. They whispered to each other for a moment. Afterwards, they look back at them.

"Sorry, but no. As the matter of fact, we just decided not to speak any of you again." Sonic informs sternly.

"Oh, come on!" Fiona complains, "Scourge, you did something like that to some of your teachers, didn't you?"

Scourge snarls, "Yeah, I did. But at least Rose didn't do anything to annoy, nag, or tell me what to do!"

After all of this commotion, the bell rings.

"We should all be getting to class," Silver says coldly.

Before walking away from them, Sonic informs them one last time, "Maybe it's best if you five stay away from us—and Amy too. That includes you, Sally Acorn."

Then, they were gone. This is the karma that Tikal implied before back at the cafeteria.

The bat, cat, and mongoose stare angrily at the malice dyad.

"Look, we may have lost our boyfriends, but isn't it worth it?" Sally asks. "I mean, don't you all find it funny how Amy reacted to the whole thing?" She and Fiona still think this situation is farcical.

They didn't answer. Instead, they just simply walk away from the duo.

"Fine! Then I guess we're going to tell the entire school about the truths about you!" Fiona shouts out to them.

"Looks like we will," Sally looks at her, "Fiona, go find Rosy."

And then she nodded.

* * *

**Author's Note: Dear Haters, this is what happens when you hurt and abuse someone who is going through so much. You should think twice before judging someone by its cover.  
**


	6. Nobody's Home

Nobody's Home

It's been two days and ever since that appalling event from the lunchroom, students couldn't stop talking about it. Sadly, Amy called home early and she was absent from school yesterday. She was too embarrassed to be around her peers and she has spent almost an entire day washing off the trauma. During her absence, the Hedgehogs 5x couldn't help but to feel more apprehensive for the Rose.

As for Sally Acorn, Fiona Fox, and the rest of their crew—let's just say half of them suffered humiliation and the other half suffered punishment.

Today, the Hedgehogs 5x are standing in the hallways, having a group conversation.

"Have any of you seen Amy today? I tried calling and texting her, but she hasn't been responding." Sonic asks his friends and they all answered no.

"She wasn't in History yesterday," Silver informs, "Class wasn't the same without her."

"And she missed Bio, too," Shadow did the same. "I just hope Rose is in school today. I already miss her."

Scourge takes out his phone and he starts reading through random things on the screen. "Well, look on the bright side," he tells them, "At least we snitched them out and they got what they deserved. Ames would've been happy about it if we told her right away that we got her back."

Manic says while playing with his drumstick in his fingertips, "Do you think she's still upset about what Sally and Fiona did to her?"

Sonic was about to answer his brother, but the group caught Tails passing by them. The genius fox is pushing a cart with a projector on top as he is heading somewhere.

"Tails!" Sonic calls out to him. He stops pushing the cart and then makes eye contact. They walk closer to him.

"Hey, guys." Tails replies to the Hedgehogs 5x.

"Tails," Manic begins. "Is Amy in school today? There's something we want to tell her."

The fox sighs as he responds, "Actually she is. I ran into her this morning," he gets cut off when the Hedgehogs 5x became relieved.

"But," their moment of relief abruptly ends, knowing that by the tone of his voice, it's not a good thing. Tails persists, "She wants me to tell you this and you're not going to like it."

"Tell us what?" Shadow remarks.

He finishes, "She kind of doesn't want to see you five again. She thinks it's better off if she stopped being around with you. Just for a personal reason."

This shocks them, "What? Why?"

Tails shrugs his shoulder, "That's all she told me. She didn't say why. Although, she seems really distraught when I saw and spoke to her. Not only that, she also wanted to stop making contact with me and the others: Cream, Tikal, Knuckles, you know it." He then gives them the sad look.

Silver asks, "Could it be something regarding to the day before yesterday? We were going to tell her that we reported Fiona and Sally to the principal."

"Yeah, and they got suspended." Sonic finishes.

At that moment, they hear Amy coming.

"Emily, for the last time," the pink hedgehog is talking on her phone, though she sounded really disheartened. Her voice breaks as she lies over the line, "I am 100 percent fine, really. There's no way I'm going back to that place, I don't want to suffer the same shit over and over again way before I came back here… Emily, please…"

She already passed by the guys and she's oblivious that they're all looking at her since she's too distracted by her emotional phone-call. The Hedgehogs 5x became concerned about what she just mentioned.

Soon, Amy heads to her locker, still not looking back at them. The hedgehog crew gazes back at Tails.

"You can try to go ask her yourselves." Tails places both of his hands back on the projector, "I have to take this back to the audio visual room. See ya later." And then he leaves, pushing the cart up front.

When Tails left, the Hedgehogs 5x make their way to the Rose.

"Hey, Ames!" Sonic calls out to her, but there's no response from her. They stroll closer to Amy as she's gathering and organizing her things into her locker. They stood around her and she's still not looking back at them.

With a closer inspection, Amy is wearing a really dark outfit, presumably symbolizing her current mood. She's wearing a black T-shirt with a broken-heart print and a charcoal-shade hoodie; a black pleaded skirt with thigh-length black-and-white striped stockings; a black headband with a skull; and finally black combat boots. Her appearance feels strange to them, barring Shadow since the darkness is secretly making him feel more attracted to her. They didn't want to say anything about it.

"Uh, hey Amy," Manic nervously begins to talk. He has his hand behind his head, "We missed you yesterday."

Amy is still ignoring them. Despite that, they persisted.

Shadow impulsively says, "Nice getup you're wearing, Rose. It…" He trails off while his crimsoned eyes are descending and ascending on her appearance, "really suits you." The 'emo' hedgehog tries to let out a smile.

Still nothing.

It's Scourge's turn now, "Babe, has anyone ever told you that—" he tried to come up with a pick up line to get her attention, "you look really beautiful when you're sad?" He tries to grin as well, but… nothing.

Sonic sighs (and he even smacks Scourge in the arm with the back of his hand), "Amy, look. I'm not sure you've heard of this, but—"

Right away, Amy cuts him off as she glances at them.

"They got suspended for weeks, I know. And you guys reported them for me." This surprises the Hedgehogs 5x. At least they finally got her attention.

The jock finishes, "Yeah, we had to do it. We wanted to protect you because no girl, like you, deserves to be treated like that."

"Although, you should've seen the look on their faces; they were pretty pissed. Even Sally was pissed off that she got academic suspension from her cheerleading squad." Manic informs with a smirk. The rest of the gang laughs along, just thinking about it really makes their day.

Unfortunately—Amy is still not smiling at all, not even a smirk. Now, the guys' smiles have turned back into sad frowns.

"Rose," Shadow begins, "just so you know, we'll always have your back and we will keep defending you every time you're in need." The rest nodded their heads in agreement.

The Rose continues, "I really appreciated that you did that for me and that you five really cared about me. But—I really don't think this friendship is going to work out at all." This saddens them.

Silver asks in concern, "Amy, why? How come you don't want to be with us anymore? Tails told us that you wanted to stop seeing us."

Amy is saddened, too, "I just can't, alright? You need to understand that this isn't about you, it's me. I just want to be away, that's all. I'm really sorry if this upsets you." She sniffs.

Suddenly, Amy goes back into her locker and she took something out of her storage—her panda bear, the same one they gave her. She hands it back to them.

"Here," she says, "I think Panny wants you guys back. She said she wants to go back home with you." Sonic reluctantly takes the cutesy panda bear into his hands. She persists, "I'd give you back the roses too, but it looks like they already died."

Afterwards, Amy closes her locker and pulls her backpack over her shoulder. She looks at them once more, "Bye."

The Hedgehogs 5x, now more depressed than ever, watches her leave until she's out of sight for them. They couldn't believe that the same girl they have fallen for—has left them.

As the day passes by—it has become really depressing for the Hedgehogs 5x:

At History, Silver was about to sit next to Amy, but as soon as she took a glimpse at him, all she did was move several seats away from him. She even refused to say one word to the prep hedgehog during class. It's bad enough that without her, he couldn't focus on the lecture, thus failing for the day.

At Art, Manic happily offered to help Amy with her pottery, but she pushed herself away from him. To make matters worse for the rock-star hedgehog, he accidentally made Amy ruin her project by dropping the vase onto the floor, frustrating her and making her start over. Her temporary anger caused her to ignore him for the rest of the class.

At Biology, Shadow found a rose on his way to class and he gave it to Amy to at least cheer her up a little. Alas—she intentionally (though in a sad way) broke the rose stem in half and then plucks all of its petals off, breaking the dark hedgehog's heart. Morose interfered him when he saw her sprinkle the petals out of the opened window and watched them flow through the breeze.

Out in the hallways, every time they run into her, see her, and wave at her, Amy kept strolling away from them with sadness in her eyes. She even broke Scourge's heart when she returned that little heart-shaped box he had given to her on her first day. The rebel hedgehog was heartbroken when he found out that—she returned the leather bracelet with a silver heart—it was supposed to be a welcome present from him to her.

As for Sonic, while he was doing some stretches during track training out on the track field, he caught Amy passing by on the other side of the metal chain fence. She stopped walking and she returned his gaze for a mere second. The jock couldn't help but to feel distracted by her—still depressed behavior; the look of her face was breaking him. Afterwards, she faced back to her front and resumed walking away, leaving him alone with his teammates.

As soon as the day has come to an end, the Hedgehogs 5x came into an abrupt realization after meeting each other at the front of the school. Despite that Amy told them that she doesn't want to see them again, they decided to convince her all together, whether she likes it or not. They are going to visit her house.

* * *

In the afternoon, the hedgehog crew is walking through the neighborhood, heading their way to Amy's house. It didn't take too long to get there and Sonic happens to have the address to her home, written on a piece of paper. He's been leading the way.

The Hedgehogs 5x made it there. They stood at the front porch of the private house and they stared at the architecture; 2 stories high and beautifully built in a modern theme, with its façade in a unique shade of beige and a dark scarlet rooftop. It's too stunning for them.

"Wow," Silver compliments, "I actually assumed that she'd live in a luxurious manor rather than a modern house."

"Damn. How did her family afford this?" Manic wonders.

Sonic takes a quick look at the piece of paper in his hand, "Well, this is her address alright. Papers don't lie." Then, he refolds the paper before he puts it into his pocket.

The five walk closer to the front door and Sonic rings the doorbell. After when the bell finished ringing, someone in the household opens the door for them—but it's not Amy.

Instead, an adult female hedgehog, about in her late-twenties or early thirties, stood by the doorway. She bears a striking resemblance as Amy, with her jade-green eyes and similar styled long quills, except her fur is sky-blue. She's wearing a casual outfit with a white sweater and light blue designer sweatpants. She maturely gazes at the five boys.

"Can I help you all?" She asks. Nervousness is building up inside of them.

Sonic begins, "Uh, hi. We're here to see Amy Rose. Is she home?"

Unaware to the Hedgehogs 5x, Amy was in her pajamas and she was about to descend the stairs, though she only stood at the very top. She took a quick look at the doorway and she's about to run back into her room to avoid seeing them.

"Um," the female adult hedgehog glances at Amy. Amy shakes her head, mouthing no and gestures her to make up an excuse.

The adult gazes back at the boys. She says in a sweet and sympathetic tone, "I'm sorry, but Amy's not home right now. She went to take a walk outside to get some fresh air." Amy, after hearing the excuse, quickly strolls back into her room and closes the door.

"Although," the adult continues, "I'm sure she won't mind if I allowed some visitors in for a few minutes. Would you boys like to come in?" She lets out a warming smile.

Sonic glances at the crew and they subtly nodded in agreement.

"Sure." And then, they enter the house. The adult closes the door after they step in.

"I'm Emily Violet, by the way," she introduces herself, "Amy has told me so much about you. I believe you're Shadow, Scourge, Silver, Manic, and Sonic. Is that right?" She even got their identities accurate.

"Yes, we are." Silver remarks.

The five inspects the entire living room. Its design is very modern and the interior matches the exterior of the house perfectly.

"Nice place," Shadow compliments.

"Thank you," Emily Violet responds.

Just then, they hear a little meow coming close to them. A white fluffy non-Mobian cat appears into the living room and it stood right in front of the Hedgehogs 5x, swaying its tail side to side. They stare at the little feline.

"Aww," Manic coos, "You two have a cat?"

"Yeah," Emily replies as she walks closer to the cat and strokes its back. "Her name is Serenity. Amy and I found her at the shelter and we decided to adopt her." The cat purrs.

Manic chuckles as he held his hand out to Serenity, attempting to pet her. "Here, kitty, kitty, kit—"

_HISSSSSSS!_

Serenity lets out a loud hiss at them, baring her tiny feline fangs, and trying to claw at them with her paw. Right away, the boys yelp and flinch in fear and they step away from her. Their eyes widen when they see that vicious look on the cat.

Subsequently, Serenity pounces into Emily's arms.

"Yeah, sorry about that. She doesn't like men at all. She's not really used to being around with them." She smiles while petting her and Serenity responses by purring affectionately.

"That's one serene cat you got there," Silver sarcastically comments.

Shadow starts another topic, "I don't mean to offend you, but you look awfully young to be Amy's mother."

"Mother?" Emily chuckles, "No, I'm her older sister of course."

"Sister?" They're bewildered at that statement. They never knew that Amy Rose has a sister.

"I happen to be her legitimate guardian." She informs them. "Unfortunately, our father left the picture and our mother passed away years ago."

This caught their attention and sympathy arises, "We're so sorry." Silver says.

"Thanks, and I happened to be the only one left in the family for her. You can say that I'm like a mother-figure for Amy."

Scourge takes a look through some personal framed pictures sitting on the black mahogany table. Some are of Amy, Emily, and even their mom together before her passing. The mother's fur is off-pink and she, too, had some resemblance of her daughters.

There's one photo of Emily Violet, which caught the rebel's attention, holding herself close to another female Mobian, who is about the same age as her. She depicts a golden yellow fox with long blonde-auburn hair, pink eyes, and the two were wearing sexy mini-dresses at a night-club.

Scourge is stunned when he brought the picture into his hand for a closer look. He lets out a whistle when seeing the attractive-looking fox.

"Whoa," he comments as he points the photo out to Emily. "Who's this with you?"

Emily responds, "That's Stella. She's my girlfriend." There's a pause, "And in case you're wondering, we're in a same-sex relationship."

Scourge's eyes widen in shock and he instantly puts the photo back down onto the table, careful not to break the rainbow-colored frame. Soon, he joins back to the rest of the guys as they sit by the ivory leathered couch.

Sonic changes the subject. "Emily, we actually came here because we wanted to talk to Amy. You see, she's been feeling really different lately and we were worried about her."

Emily pays close attention to the statement. Carefully, she puts Serenity back down on the floor. She then lets out an adorable meow as she scuttles up the stairs. "Let me guess, some girls at school treated her like shit?"

"You knew?" Shadow asks.

"She told me as soon as possible right after the incident happened, and I had to pick her up to take her home early. She missed school yesterday because of—some personal issues. She didn't tell you about self-mutilation, did she?"

They all answered no.

"That's what I was afraid of," she says.

The intelligent hedgehog asks once again, "How did she get involved into this?"

Emily continues the whole sad story about the Rose. "Four years ago, when I first found out that Amy ran away from home, I got deeply worried and I feared that something terrible would happen to her. I searched from neighborhood to neighborhood, looking for her and suddenly, when I came by the park… my fears came true."

She pauses and takes a deep breath before finishing, "She was trying to take her life away by hanging herself on one of the trees. Miraculously, she was still breathing when I got up to her, although she was unconscious. The only option I had left was to take her to the hospital and thank God, they were able to save her in time.

"As I sat by the hospital bed, staying by her side, Amy told me she did it because of—some guy she was with broke her heart into pieces and he treated her like trash."

While the others are feeling devastated, Sonic secretly feels some remorse going on. He didn't remember that moment… until now. No one knows about this, but—he was alleged for Amy's suicide attempt years back. He was the one who treated her like that and broke her fragile little heart.

Emily resumes, "The doctors recommended her to check into an institution. They thought it'd be best if she did go because they didn't want any more suicides going on. So—we both agreed.

"After years of psychological help from the institution, Amy has changed drastically. Days after she came back home, I caught her performing self-injury in the bathroom. I asked her why she's doing it and—she told me that she had trouble getting along with the other patients back at the place. Apparently, she's been keeping that to herself every time I visited her during hours. She lied to me that everything went alright, even though it was far from alright. They verbally and emotionally abused her real badly, and due to the torment, she self-mutilates. Not that she's trying to kill herself again—which I hope won't happen—she's doing it as a way to relief herself. Aside with that—Amy's also diagnosed with an eating disorder."

"Eating disorder?" Sonic asks, "Is she bulimic?"

"Anorexia more specifically," Emily answers as she continues, "Amy's fear of weight gain is much severe than bulimia. She also told me that one of the patients said to her that no one will like her because of her body type, and she forced her to starve herself, thus making her feel insecure about her body. I tried to persuade her to go to a specialist, and by that I meant like therapy or a psychologist, but she's so stubborn. She refused to seek help because she fears that the torment will remain persistent. It worries me a lot."

There's another pause, and Emily concludes, "It's really difficult for the both of us."

"Crap," Manic says, "I feel sorry for her now."

Emily sighs softly as she remarks to Manic's statement, "Honestly, I don't know how much of this will last. Hopefully in time, Amy will come to her senses that there are others in her life who care deeply about her and that they want to help her improve." She then makes another full eye contact with the boys, "It's a good thing that you five showed some sincerity for my sister."

There's complete silence for about a minute. Keeping that disheartening remorseful frown on his façade, the rest of the gang glances at Sonic. His current facial expression is new to them.

"Bro? Are you okay?" Manic asks Sonic. Immediately, the jock gets up from the couch.

"Sorry, Emily," he impetuously says, "but I think I have to go. If Amy comes back, tell her that we said 'hi'." Afterwards, he exits the house, leaving his friends and brother behind. He closes the door behind him.

In reality, Sonic doesn't want the others to think about what he had done to cause Amy to suffer such pain for the last four years. It's possible that they might resent him for that.

Soon, they gaze back at Emily, "We apologize about that, I'm assuming that something went inside his head." Silver tells her as he gets up. The others did the same, "Do you mind if we leave early?"

"No, not at all," Emily sympathetically responds, "I understand. And I'll inform Amy that you paid a visit. Thanks for stopping by anyway." They nodded and left the house.

Once they're out, Emily Violet gazes out the window as she watches them leave. She can see that the four are trying to ask Sonic what was wrong, but their dialogues are muffled behind the thick glass. She witnesses the athlete pushing himself away and he resumes walking, while simultaneously they attempted to get his attention as they follow him.

Subsequently, she leaves the window and ascends the stairs, heading straight to Amy's room. The door is already wide opened and Emily can see the Rose sitting on the floor, leaning her back against her bed. Their cat Serenity is in her arms; she's purring in comfort while Amy is stroking her soft fluffy white fur. There's sadness in her eyes.

Emily gets herself closer to her sister, in apprehension. She crouches down adjacent to her and Amy returns the eye contact. The adult female strokes her pink quills.

"Did they know?" Amy asks meekly. She nodded, causing her to become more morose.

"I'm sorry, baby girl," Emily responds in a motherly tone. Then, Amy lays her head on top of her shoulder, while Emily wraps her arms around her younger sibling, resting her chin on her head.

Outside of their house, EVERYONE is completely unaware that they have another guest, hiding in between the bushes and the exterior wall of the house, just below one of the windows. The (other) pink hedgehog has been sitting there this whole time since the Hedgehogs 5x first walked in, presumably spying again. But—despite her villainous personality—something doesn't feel right for her at all.

Standing up from the bushes, Rosy the Rascal slowly lets down her notebook and she's completely confused; she doesn't know whether she should be feeling sympathetic or antagonizing towards Amy after overhearing the true facts about her (and she sure has ears of a hawk).

The reason why? No one knows about this, not even Sally and her crew, but—Rosy is bipolar—and she could relate to the exact same issues that Amy underwent.

Aside with her own illness, she, too, was severely heartbroken and disheartened by someone she used to love—Scourge. Her heartbreak from him caused her to develop a near-fatal episode that almost cost her life.

Rosy is lost in her trail of thoughts as she thinks about her own past. At that moment, her phone vibrates, interrupting her thoughts. She answers it, "Hello?"

It's Sally on the other line, _"Rosy, did you find anything new about her?"_

There's a pause. The silence was about 30 seconds long.

"_Hello? Are you there? I _said_, did you get some new stuff about Amy?"_ Sally demanded sternly.

Without letting her know, Rosy suddenly tears up her new notes from her notebook. Pieces of white lined paper are flowing into the breeze as they land on the ground.

"Sorry, but—no." The 'deviant' hedgehog coldly lies to the leader. Then, she hangs up her phone in anger.


	7. Show and Tell

Show and Tell

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'RE OUT?!"

Sally screams at Rosy in rage. The two, along with Fiona, are having a heated argument in the back of the school—albeit that the dyad is suspended.

"I mean I'm out!" Rosy retaliates. Her temper is starting to get severe for her.

"Don't tell me you're leaving us, too!" the chipmunk persists, "You're our spy! Your job is to make others miserable as hell by revealing all of their darkest secrets!"

"Well, I quit! You two can find yourselves a new spy! And frankly, I truly feel bad about what you made me do to those three!" Rosy comes clean. "Do you even know how much pain we're causing them?! Hell, they couldn't even stop crying about it!"

What she just said was true. The three former girls who have left the group recently suffered their own karma when Rosy was forced to expose their secrets on the 'Chaotic Chat' column online about a few days ago. Now—the entire school knows about them.

Rouge was being hated and accused for stealing, when in reality, she's a recovering kleptomaniac; she's still seeking therapy and treatment outside of the school for her impulsive control disorder. Blaze ended up on academic probation when she got caught plagiarizing several essays and cheated on a few exams… due to her stress and anxiety attacks. Mina experienced humiliation when the school saw a video of her singing, or lip-synching, malfunction; she really thought her laryngitis wouldn't stop her from performing on a talent show until the recording behind the curtain went on a fritz.

Fiona argues, "They truly deserved it! That's what they get for abandoning us! Why do you want to leave us anyway?!"

Rosy stammers on the question. She knows that she is not allowed to tell anyone about her condition.

On impulse, she screams, "I can't say, okay? Because that's really NONE OF YOUR FUCKING CONCERN!" The last part was a shrill, loud enough for anyone nearby the schoolyard to hear.

Some bystanders hear their conversation as they pause and stare at the three. Fiona returns their gazes, "MIND YOUR BUSINESS, PEOPLE! THIS MEETING IS PRIVATE!" She growls at the students, scaring them as they walk away.

Rosy continues, ameliorating the shrillness of her tone, "And speaking of which, do you even know what that Amy-girl is going through?! Do you even know what it's like to live in such a difficult life?! Not everyone is all happy, rainbows, and unicorns everyday! What you two made me do was such a disgrace and I shouldn't have done this in the first place!" Then, Rosy pauses, taking a few deep breaths.

Sally retaliates, "We don't even give a flying shit about her feelings, or the others! Since when did you decide to be on her side?!"

"Again, that's none of your damn business. Mina was right all along, you two are horrible people and I shouldn't have listened to any of you. Once again, I quit!" Rosy glances at Fiona, "And you are lucky enough that I faked this whole 'being-nice-to-you' thing when you told me that Scourge broke up with you. With him or not, I never wanted to be friends with you anyway!"

Fiona scoffs, "Whatever, I still don't like you either! You don't deserve to be with him!"

Still glaring at the duo, Rosy takes her backpack off the ground and then carries it over her shoulder. "You should get out of here. You know what happens to students who show up on school grounds during suspension." She threatens them before she leaves to the entrance.

The chipmunk and the fox, now on their own, watch her walk into the school. Deep inside, they have never been this outraged before.

Inside the building, Rosy the Rascal, still feeling infuriated after the whole fight with them, scurries her way through the corridors with only about fifteen minutes until the bell. She runs into the girls' restroom and then goes to the sinks and mirrors. Dropping her backpack onto the floor, she quickly unzips it to search for a couple of things she needed: her water bottle and her pills. Instantly, Rosy opens the bottle, takes one dose out, and then inserts it into her mouth as she closes the cap back on. Subsequently, she opens her water next to take a sip and swallows the pill down, careful enough to not choke on it.

Seconds after taking her medication, Rosy can already feel the tension ameliorating itself. Getting up from the floor, she stares at herself in the mirror; instead of seeing her own reflection—she sees Amy. She has a weird feeling that somehow, she and the Rose are one and the same. Just like her, the Rascal is, too, playing the hide and seek game whenever she's around with people.

Feeling lost in her thoughts, the door opens. Rosy quickly glances at whom just walked in—her look-alike. The awkward moment appears when the two pink hedgehogs are staring at one another.

"Hello," Amy says monotonously to her.

"Hello, yourself." Rosy did the same, especially with that monotone voice.

Simultaneously, they slowly ascend and descend their eyes on each other's appearance. It's like a mirror, except their quills are styled differently and their clothes they're currently wearing are—coincidentally reversible with only a small difference.

Amy is wearing a black long-sleeve top, a white skirt, grey tights, and black ankle boots with heels. Rosy, on the other hand, is wearing a white top, a black skirt, similar grey tights, and white heeled ankle boots. The only difference is that Rosy is wearing a dark denim jacket.

They make another eye contact. The feeling is really creepy and they swore they felt the chills in their spines.

"Rosy?" Amy guessed her name.

"Yes. And you're Amy Rose. I've heard a lot about you." Rosy responds.

"Let me guess—"

And then, they answered at the same time…

"You've read about me on that school gossip column on the website."

"I've read about you on that school gossip column on the website."

There's complete silence between them. Rosy lied on her statement because she doesn't want to let Amy know that she's the one who wrote about her.

She lies again, "That RascalBrat person must be a total bitch. I mean, who the hell goes into other people's private lives and then writes about it in the public site? That's just wrong."

"Tell me about it," Amy agrees.

"How did you know my name, by the way?" Rosy asks her.

Amy shrugs, "Several of my friends mentioned you to me a few times before. They told me that you look a lot like me." She quickly glances at the Rascal's appearance again, "But I don't see the resemblance."

Rosy did the same thing to her, "Me neither. They must be blind or something." She looks at the time on her phone. "I should get going."

"Well…I guess," Amy pauses, "maybe we'll talk again the next time we see each other."

"Yeah… again. I guess." Then, Rosy exits the bathroom while Amy walks into one of the stalls.

Once Rosy is out in the hallways again, she takes out her phone to do another right thing. On her way to her class, she is about to delete her profile from the 'Chaotic Chat' column, now that she no longer works for Sally and Fiona. Although, she's too focused on the screen and she couldn't really pay attention to the direction she's heading.

Someone bumps into Rosy, causing her to drop her phone on the floor. The device didn't even break, but she got irritated about it.

"Would you watch where you're going?" She coldly says to the Mobian that just ran into her. She crouches down to retrieve it.

"Geez, sorry." A male green hedgehog frigidly remarks at her attitude.

When Rosy gets up and makes eye contact with him—Scourge is surprised to see her.

"Rosy?" The rebel stunningly says her name. Ever since that harsh rejection—things have changed between them.

"Oh, it's you." Rosy replies cruelly. She's seemingly still mad about how he treated her back then.

"Damn, you look… different." Scourge comments while still bewildered. Just like Sonic and Amy years back, the same issue had once occur to Scourge and Rosy. Yes, Rosy used to dress in childish clothes, like Amy, and yes, she used to be as deeply obsessed with him as Amy was with Sonic.

"Yeah, thanks." She says with sarcasm while going through her phone, "You haven't changed much either. Shouldn't you be ready for class?" With that, she finally got the profile deleted.

"No," he answers, "I don't even give a shit about Health. I'm not going to be a freaking doctor, so who cares? Might as well cut and risk getting an 'F'."

She puts her phone away. "Then, what are you going to be, some kind of a playboy?"

Scourge notices the persistent harshness in her tone. He asks nervously, "Are you still pissed off about before?"

Abruptly, the Rascal's mood changed from mean to sadness; she's now thinking about that moment in the past regarding to the calamity from Scourge. Way before the two broke up, he rejected Rosy for Fiona because of her crazy obsession with him. Rosy then got into a severe breakdown with a broken heart—and the rest is too disheartening to tell.

She sniffs, "What do you think? I almost killed myself before right after you did that to me."

It's just like Sonic and Amy all over again. Scourge sees the sadness in her eyes. He sighs, "Look, I'm really sorry, okay? I never meant to hurt you, but I didn't even know that you would do something harsh to yourself. Listen, I'm not with her anymore—"

Rosy cuts him off and snaps, "You don't have to tell me. If you don't like me, then I respect that. I'll do you a favor; I'll leave you alone for good, okay? You don't have to worry about me obsessing over you. As the matter of fact, there might be a chance that I may never be in this world ever again. Goodbye, Scourge." Her voice broke at the end.

She leaves, separating herself away from him. Scourge watches her leave until she's gone. While doing so, he couldn't help but to feel some remorse and all at once—preoccupied by Rosy's new fully grown, mature appearance. He couldn't believe that he's now starting to feel just a tad attracted to the Rascal. No, it's more than just a tad—it's bigger.

Subsequently, Scourge heads to his friends, who were waiting for him before the bell rings. Deep down, he's unable to get the thought about Rosy out of his head.

"Dude, who was that girl you were talking to?" Manic asks him.

"That's Rosy," Scourge clears his throat, attempting to hide his remorse away from the gang, "She used to have some kind of crush on me, but… it's a long story."

The rebel then notices Sonic staring blankly and solemnly around the corner of the hallway. He's staring at the usual spot where Amy walks to her first class.

"What's with Blue?" he asks the other three.

Silver responses, "He's been like this since we walked in. Apparently, he's incorrigibly melancholic about yesterday after our visit at Amy's house."

They gave him confused looks, "Incorri-what?" Manic asks.

The prep sighs, "He's still feeling sad."

"Oh," The rock-star now understands.

Shadow finishes off, "And he's still not telling us why. I wonder what his deal is. Honestly, I can't stand seeing like this anymore, it's getting on my nerves."

At that moment—Amy appears down the hall. Without letting his friends and brother see his facial expression, Sonic lets out an inaudible gasp, knowing that he'll finally be able to at least make some contact with her. When Amy walks down the corridor, she instantly passes by the Hedgehogs 5x; they're looking at her and she returns their glimpse.

But it's not what Sonic hoped for. As she glances at them for a mere second, the jock is giving her a subtle smile, despite that he's feeling lachrymose in the inside, while the rest of the crew gave her tiny waves and warming smiles of their own. Amy on the other hand—didn't return anything. She's still ignoring them because deep down, she's too afraid to be around with them now that they know about her—true self. She glances away from the Hedgehogs 5x and resumes walking to her class.

Now—the boys quickly alter back to unhappiness. Sonic slowly turns around to face to them.

"Sonic," Manic begins, "You know you cannot stay like this forever."

Silver commences, "Your brother is right. Remaining pessimistic for a prolonged time is not good for you, even for the rest of us."

Finally, Sonic replies to them—gloomily. "At least I'm not becoming like Shadow," he gazes at the dark hedgehog, "No offense."

"None taken," Shadow remarks.

The bell suddenly rings.

Sonic looks at them once more before everyone heads off their separate ways. "See you guys later." Then, he sadly walks away.

_Hours later…_

It's dismissal time and everyone is exiting out of the school.

Amy is wrapping her arms securely around her stomach as she slowly walks out of the doors along with the students. Instead of being all blissful and loquacious, like the rest of them, she is completely lachrymose and silent. Her head is down, staring straight at the ground, and she's walking along the pavement as if she's an outsider.

"Amy, wait!" She hears someone calling her name. Amy lifts her head back up after hearing the familiar voice. She turns around—and she sees him.

Sonic runs straight to her. Amy is about to turn back around and walk away from him, but the jock is too swift. He made it to her in seconds.

"Amy, please don't go yet," Sonic tells her as he places his hand on her shoulder to get her attention. He seems really apprehensive when he looked at her. "I really need to talk to you. It's important."

Amy responds in pain, "Sonic, no. I'm not in the mood to talk. I really need to get going." She faces away, but Sonic soothingly turns her back around to make full eye contact with him. She notices the pained expression in his emerald eyes.

"Please, Ames?" Sonic begs to her, "Look, there's something that I really need to tell you and I can't keep it in any longer. Also, this is something that I can't let the others know, too, so we're going to have to go some place where we can be alone."

"I don't know, Sonic."

"Please?" A subtle tear wells up in the corner of his eye. Sonic pleads once more as Amy perceives the complete sorrow in him. She makes her decision.

"Are you sure that—?" She asks, but her question gets cut off.

He instantly answers, "Yes, it's just you and me. No one else. I already told the gang that I want to talk to you alone and they understand."

Amy finally responses, "Okay, I'll talk." He sighs in relief.

Carefully, Sonic takes Amy's hand and he leads her the way to the other side of the school. She has no idea where exactly they're heading.

"Where are we going?" She asks again.

"To some place where no one in the school has ever been to very often." He answers.

Soon, the two hedgehogs reach at the very back of the school yard, pass through the track and football field, and then to the metal chain-linked fence. Before they can go through, Amy perceives through the gate and she is stunned. There are flowers of many breeds, bushes, and small trees everywhere.

"Wow, I didn't even know that the school has a garden." Amy comments silently.

Sonic shrugs his shoulder. "Neither did I until Tails and Cream told me about it. They told me they came here before and it was really nice."

"Are you sure we're allowed to go in? It's too beautiful to be entered by others."

"As long as no one finds us, we'll be safe." Sonic then grasps onto the door of the fence and surprisingly, it's unlocked. Cautiously, he opens it for the Rose. He lets out a smile.

"After you," He says while holding a door like a gentleman. Amy tries to let out a smile back and she takes her first step in. Afterwards, Sonic strides in and closes the door behind.

Amy takes a whole glimpse at the garden. It's so beautiful, even up close inside. Sonic takes her hand again and they stroll together along the concrete pavement in between the patches of flowers and plantations.

"I can't believe that this place is completely empty," She says while still glimpsing at the sight. The scent of flowers and fresh air is really tranquil for her.

Since the garden is not so big though not so small, the two reaches to the very end where a bed of roses is located. They stood adjacent to the rose patch and they face to each other perfectly, making full eye contact.

"So, what is it that you really need to tell me, Sonic?" Amy asks.

Sonic sighs as he is about to tell the whole story to her.

"Amy, I know that this is too traumatizing for you to talk about this but," he pauses, "when me and my pals went to your house and talked to your sister, she said that you attempted suicide four years ago."

That thought returns to her; she lets her head down for a moment. Sonic, sincerely, lifts her chin back up as he persists,

"And, I don't know if you remembered much, but—" The statement gets cut off.

Amy sniffs and sobs, "I can never forget that. You really hurt me back then. You yelled at me so cruelly and then you told me that you didn't want to see me again. The pain in my heart was too unbearable, so I had to get away. When I first saw you and the others again, I actually thought that you wouldn't remember the time you shattered me and then got me into that hellhole right after I tried to kill myself. So I acted as if it never happened every time I'm with you."

She lets out another sniff before she continues, "I had to do that because I didn't want to accuse you at first. When I looked at you, I still have deep feelings for you, but at the same time, I was still mad at you. The reason why I refused to speak to you and the others is because I worried about what you all might think, now that you know I—" Amy stops, not wanting to mention two of her horrifying conditions.

Sonic is now watching her cry in emotional pain. He brings her closer to him for comfort by wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on her head. He even strokes her quills. Her face is set on his shirt underneath his varsity jacket. The smell of his cologne and the artificial leather of his jacket are calming her down.

"I'm really sorry for that." He says softly to her.

Amy looks up at him, "What do you mean?"

"I mean, I'm really sorry if I caused you all that pain. To tell you the truth, I didn't remember that time until Emily brought that up, even though she didn't specify the name. When your sister mentioned it, I couldn't help but to feel really guilty; I didn't have the courage to tell the gang that I was the guy to broke your heart severely, because I don't want them to know and they still don't know. I didn't want them to hate me for putting you through all that hell at that—place."

Sonic sniffs, sharing his emotions with her. "I never meant to hurt you so harshly. I was just mad at the way you chased me around and I really thought that you have some kind of love-sick fan-girl crush on me. I was really annoyed at first because of your immaturity. But when I looked at you, I realized that you've changed. You're not that same old Amy Rose with a child-like personality who always chased me down; you've changed into a more beautiful and mature young woman, and that got me." He lets out a warming smile.

Amy is touched by his last statement. "You really think I've changed that much?"

Sonic nods his head. Then, his smile quickly turns back into a solemn frown. "But most importantly, we, especially Emily, are also really worried about the fact you cut yourself and you having an eating disorder. If you want, maybe we can have some kind of group meeting with the others and we'll help you deal with what you're going through. You know we're here for you if you ever needed someone to talk to other than just Emily. How's that sound, Ames?"

She thought about it, "I'd like that very much."

"And," Sonic resumes when his smile returns, "I'm starting to grow really attracted to you."

Then, the two broke off from their embrace. Sonic goes to the patch and he takes his hand in there. Carefully, he picks one of the roses out of its bed and hands it to Amy. Amy sincerely accepts the rose as she takes it into her own hands. It's pink, just like her fur, and it literally glistens under the sunlight, possibly because it still has dew on its petals.

It's her turn to smile now. "Thanks, Sonic. I don't know what to do without you."

Sonic gently strokes her cheek with the back of his hand, "And just so you know, me and the guys will keep protecting you from Sally or Fiona or anyone else who gets under your skin. If they want to hurt you, they're going to have to go through us." He winks at her.

This makes her chuckle, "You are so devoted. That's what I like about you."

"So, do you forgive me about that past?"

"Yes, and just so _you_ know—I'll get back with you and everyone else."

The jock is completely happy at the fact that Amy is finally willing to be friends with the Hedgehogs 5x and the rest of their devoted friends again.

"That great! I can notify them that you decided to speak with us again." Sonic says. "Oh, and I almost forgot."

He takes his backpack off his shoulder and unzips it. He goes in and he takes out the stuffed panda bear that he has been holding on to ever since she returned it. Sonic shows it to her. "Panny really misses you and she wants to come back home with you."

Before she takes it back, Sonic playfully rubs the panda's head against her neck. Amy lets out a laugh as it tickles against her sensitive skin. She takes it back into her hands. "I really miss Panny, too." Then, she snuggles it, which pleases him.

Afterwards, the two look up at the sky together. The sun is almost halfway setting.

"It's getting late," Amy tells him, "Will you take me home?"

"Of course," Sonic holds Amy's hand once again and the two make their way out of the garden.

As they are strolling hand to hand from school to home, they have a tête-à-tête, "So what made Sally change from a sweetheart to a total mean girl?" The Rose asks.

The jock answers, "I'm assuming that it has something to do with her being friends with Fiona the Witch and Scourge told me that she is the biggest, most evil bitch in the entire school. She probably changed her attitude because of her," The two hedgehogs can be heard laughing together.

On their way back home, all Sonic and Amy hoped for is that nothing bad will ever happen to any one of them. As soon as the two head to the front of Amy's place—they are oblivious that they're being watched.

Sally Acorn hides behind a tree that is across the Rose's house. She takes a glimpse at the two with resentment written all over her face as she leans her hands against the tree bark.

"You got me suspended and for that, you shall pay." The chipmunk snarls.

She watches as Amy waves goodbye to Sonic before she goes inside and he goes back home.

"Amy Rose, you are so dead."


	8. Crystal Clear

Crystal Clear

It's been a couple of weeks. Throughout those days, everything went smoothly for Amy Rose and the Hedgehogs 5x ever since that talk back at the school's garden.

There were a lot of laughs in the entire group. For instance, Manic showed off some of his skateboarding stunts down at the school yard and several of his accidents have made their day (or at least he have 'failed' intentionally just to entertain them); there was one time when all six had shopping cart joyrides at a supermarket; and who could forget? Four days ago, Scourge devised a plan to TP and egg Fiona Fox's house, which they all happily participated and it was a good thing they didn't get caught.

Yes, these activities have really brought a lot of amusement, especially for Amy, now that the dark cloud from above her head has faded away. Hanging around with Sonic, Silver, Manic, Scourge, and Shadow have made her forget all the things that those—girls—have done to her.

It's also great news that Amy has been talking to Tails, Knuckles, Cream, Tikal, and of course the Hedgehogs 5x about her weaknesses. Ever since that intervention they, along with Emily Violet, staged for her the day after Sonic took her to the garden, Amy has made a commitment to stay strong for herself and everyone she deeply cares for. She even made a pact to persist battling her anorexia, self-injury, and depression—and she did.

Today, the six hedgehogs have entered the school. They all are walking through the hallways together and there's laughter from the group, with Amy being in the very center.

"So right on the balcony of his apartment, he was opening the champagne bottle by squeezing the neck with his hands and before you know it, it popped and we watched the cork fly right out from 10 stories high," Amy exclaims, "Then, we heard some passerby screaming 'where the hell did that flying cork came from?' from the very bottom of the building!" She lets out a laugh.

The Hedgehogs 5x laughed along as they all stood in the middle of the corridors.

"I'm guessing that it landed on his head or something!" Sonic comments as the crack-up persists loudly.

"Probably," Amy finishes off.

During this moment, Manic is trying to hold back his laughter while un-wrapping the aluminum foil from his breakfast burrito.

"Okay, you really need to stop making me laugh, I'm trying to eat." The rock-star chuckles. He crumbles the foil into his left hand whilst holding his roll into his other. "You don't want me to die while choking, do you?"

Scourge jokingly remarks, "Then at least close your mouth when you chew, like you always do every time we eat together!"

With that, the rebel playfully smacks Manic on his upper back, causing him to drop his burrito. Everyone sees the hand-held food sitting on top of the tiled floor.

"Looks like you don't want it any—"Sonic says, but he gets cut off before he could finish.

"Five-second rule!" Manic then shouts as he picks his breakfast back up. Instantly—he takes a big bite of it, despite it was on the mildly contaminated floor. He lets out an arrogant smirk.

"Ew!" Everyone is disgusted at his action.

"What? It's not that bad!" He persists eating it.

"It's not sanitary, Manic!" Silver informs him. Subsequently, the roaring laughter from the group returns.

As the sextet resumes walking, everyone's laughter suddenly ameliorates into giggles and smirks when they're about a few yards away from the Rose's locker. They pause and Amy faces to them.

"I got to get ready for English," she tells them as she attempts to hold back her laugh, "I'll see you guys either in class or later in the hallways."

The boys accepted her agenda; soon, they all exchanged their byes to her before they head off to their separate ways. Afterwards, she turns back around and heads toward her locker.

Amy turns the dial to undo the lock. When she opens the door, she sets her bag into her storage to gather her necessities and possibly do some quick organizing in her supplies. While doing so—she can't help but to feel some infatuation going on with the Hedgehogs 5x.

She comments each and everyone one of them in her head, "Sonic, my very first love, is so handsome and heart-warming and he always will be. But he's not the only one: Manic is really cute and funny with a great sense of humor; both Shadow and Scourge are really sexy with two different unique personalities; and Silver is so smart and dazzling at the same time. I know I can't date all of them at once. Now, the choice is hard to make; I can't decide who to choose…"

Amy looks around the inside of her locker. She has some photos, taped inside, of her and the guys hanging out together, reminiscing all the times she had with them throughout these passed weeks. She lets out a warming smile. Their laughs and smiles are what made her day. It's their devotion, compassion, and even integrity she's attracted to. Her heart is now in five pieces since she couldn't make up her mind for the perfect hedgehog she wants to be with.

A moment after her sweet nostalgia, she goes back into doing her agenda. The second she's about to put one of her books into her bag, someone says her name in a considerate tone,

"Hey, Amy?"

The Rose stops what she was doing for now and gazes at whom just called her. She looked at behind the locker door and there stood—them: the three former cronies of Sally Acorn and Fiona Fox. The yellow and purple mongoose was the one who just called her; she's standing in between the bat and the cat.

After looking at the three, Amy lets out a scowl. Apparently, she can never forget that time.

"Oh, hello girls," she tells them with a small hint of coldness. "I've haven't seen you three for a while."

Mina remarks apologetically, "Are you still mad at us?"

"Maybe," Amy responds while keeping a frown in her face.

"Well," the singer-mongoose pauses with a silent sigh, "we're really sorry for what we did. Can you ever forgive us?"

While keeping the conversation going and averting her eyes into her storage, Amy continues to gather her supplies she needed for her class, "I don't know, it's hard to forgive and mostly, I just can't forget. You don't even know what I've been through."

Blaze responds, "Actually, we do."

This caught the Rose's attention, "Huh?" She stops and then gazes back at them.

The intellect continues, "It's true that we were envy of you, but when we first heard about your—you know, we actually felt bad about what you were going through. We were really trying to stop Sally and Fiona from putting you into more severe pain, but…" She pauses.

"But what?" Amy responds while closing her locker and then strapping her bag over her shoulder.

The trio takes a quick glance at one another before Blaze resumes, "We couldn't because they blackmailed us."

Rouge informs, "They told us if we failed to follow what they said, they'd revealed our deepest secrets to the entire school. And sadly, they did."

Mina finishes, "It was terrible. I had to go incognito until everyone forgets, so I could avoid shame from my performance. No one could understand that I lost my voice by the night of the talent show and I didn't even expect that the recording would go shitty in the middle of it."

Rouge begins her own statement, "I had to go to therapy according to the school counselor's orders, even though I'm still controlling myself from theft. Honestly, I've haven't been stealing anything for months, but I still had to go."

"And for the very first time in my life, I got both detention and academic probation for dishonesty." Blaze affirms with guilt, "I had several anxiety attacks while I was studying and I got pressured into copying off some essays and answers during exams."

"Overall," the bat concludes, "What we're trying to say is that—you're not alone. As you could see, none of us are perfect and we shouldn't have let our jealousy get the best of us."

This surprises Amy, "Wow, that's just—I can't believe that an intellect, an aspiring singer, and a fashionista, like you three, went through all of that. I'm so sorry to hear about your obscurities and misfortunes."

At that moment, the first bell rings.

"I have to go," The Rose is about to take off, but one of them stops her for a moment. Tenderly, she touches her shoulder.

"Wait," Amy turns to make eye contact with Blaze, "Listen, we still need to talk. We have some important things to tell you." The cat lets her hand down from her shoulder, "Do you think it's okay if we can see you during your lunch period?"

They give her a moment to think about it. Then, Amy replies, "We'll see."

Afterwards, the hedgehog turns around and heads to her class, leaving the triad alone and without even saying one goodbye.

* * *

It's free period time.

Amy is texting whilst exiting out of the classroom. During her last lecture, she couldn't stop thinking whether or not she should talk to the three earlier this morning. She was thinking of the pros and cons while taking Trigonometry notes.

Pro: What Blaze said could be serious, according to that solemn look on her face. She did say that they're important, but what? Are their apologies and sympathies serious as well? If Amy forgives them, maybe they would leave her alone or possibly learn to be friends with her.

Con: What if it's another trick and they're secretly undercover for—you know who? What if they hurt her again? What if they're pretending to be sympathetic all along? If she refuses to forgive, then more dramatic crises may occur.

It's 50-50. Now—the choice is tough to make for the confused Rose.

She puts her phone away into her pocket inside her bag and she makes her way to the cafeteria. Minding her business, she strolls through the hallways, passing by the grandiloquent and loquacious students.

Within yards away, she makes it to the double doors of the cafeteria. Just before she's about to walk in with her palm laying against the door, someone calls her, "Amy."

Amy turns around for a second and she sees Blaze, coming towards her. She lets her hand down from the door and soon, the cat stood next to her.

"Have you thought about it?" She asks Amy.

"About that," the hedgehog responds, "I'm still thinking about it. I was just heading into the lunchroom because I thought you guys might be there."

"Actually, we're in the library. We figured that would be a better place other than the cafeteria. Do you mind if I take you there?"

The Rose takes a quick glance through the double doors, and then faces back at Blaze. She sighs with reluctance, "I guess not."

After the talk, the two make their way to the library. During their walk, Amy asks, "What's something imperative that you guys need to tell me?"

Blaze went quiet for a quick second, "I'm not sure if you—"

"I do." The Rose answers by impulse, not even knowing what she had to say before she could finish her sentence.

There's another silence, and then the cat answers, "It's about Sally Acorn."

After hearing the words, Amy stops walking. Blaze notices this and she, too, stops walking to gaze at her. She can see that sullen look on her face, thinking that talking about someone, like Sally, is not going to be a good idea. Despite that, Blaze has no option but to tell Amy the life story about the chipmunk.

"Maybe, I should—"Amy tries to inform, but again she gets cut off.

"No, please don't go." Blaze tenderly begs her, "it's very crucial if we tell you some things you don't know about her. Otherwise, she and Fiona may come back as soon as their suspension is over and you may never know what they might do to you next. Plus, me, Rouge and Mina also want to help you, now that we're no longer friends with them. But first, we must tell you the factual truths about Sally."

Hearing that statement made Amy realized that this is something she cannot ignore or deny. What she just mentioned could be right, albeit she may never know if more drama and danger may come back any time in the future. Maybe having a talk with them won't be such a bad idea after all. Maybe they are being serious at first.

Immediately, Amy answers, "Okay, I'll talk."

Subsequently, both girls face to their direction and resume walking to their destination just in time before the warning bell rings.

When Amy and Blaze step through the double doors of the library, they could see Rouge and Mina sitting at the very back of the room. Both are presumably reading through some magazines as they wait for them to show up. The two then walk closer to the bat and mongoose, careful enough not the make a sound to disturb other students in the library.

They took their seats, facing opposite to the other duo, and setting their bags on top of the table. Rouge and Mina notices their presence and then they close the magazine they were reading before they set it aside with the others.

"Good, you made it." Mina stated.

"Yeah, I did." Amy responds. "Blaze told me this is regarding to Sally. Is it true that you guys want to—help me?" They answer by nodding their heads.

"To be deeply honest with you," Mina commences with sincerity, "we really don't want to cause any more trouble towards you. That's why we decided to be on your side."

"Wow, that's really," Amy pauses, trying to think of a word to describe this, "considerate of you guys."

"To begin with," Rouge says, "Do you know anything in her history?"

"Well, while I was with Sonic the other day, all he told me is that Sally befriended with Fiona on the first time they met and then her behavior suddenly changed, or that ever since she joined the cheerleading team, she decided to change. Either way, I'm implying that this has something to do with a psychological effect." The Rose informs.

It's Blaze turn, "What you said could be the source. You see, from what I've discovered, she didn't exactly psychologically alter when she joined the team; that was after when she met Fiona Fox."

Amy is slightly perplexed, but she's able to get the information down in her head. "Really?"

The prep-intellect persists, "And it's not just Sally we want to inform you about. It's Fiona, too. I'm not sure you know, but she happens to be the most noncompliant student the school has ever had in history and—she's really dangerous."

The female hedgehog widened her eyes, "Dangerous how?"

Rouge finishes for Blaze, "It's better off if you not know because we don't want to bring any fear to this school—especially you."

Mina cuts in, "Although, all we could say is that she heavily smokes and drinks, despite being underage."

There's a pause.

Blaze resumes, "Getting back to Sally, ever since she became friends with her, Fiona is pretty much the reason why she transformed into a badass bitch. She was so drawn to the adrenaline and the activities she normally does every day that she decided to follow her footsteps. Fiona has taught her a lot of things, like stealing valuable things from the mall, skipping classes, being disrespectful to the teachers in this school, and sneaking around after curfew, all without getting caught at all. Ever since then, Sally now believes that being all malevolent is a great way to get what she wants, which is why she refuses to change back to her normal beneficial side.

"Aside with that, we knew about Sally dating Sonic and Fiona dating Scourge before. Unfortunately for those two couples, Fiona cheated on him for another guy and it pissed off Scourge a lot. Right after he broke up with her, Fiona was so outraged about that, she started vandalizing and bashing his motorcycle. As for Sonic, it's not just her newly-formed attitude of hers; he realized how much trouble Sally has been causing around lately. He couldn't stand seeing her being disobedient and malicious every day that he decided to officially break up with her."

Amy is even more surprised about the full facts, despite that she already knew some of them, "Oh my God."

"Yeah, pretty crazy. We know." Rouge says.

"I have a question," Amy begins, "why did you guys become friends with them before?"

There's another pause until Mina breaks the silence. "It's a long story, really." Then, she whispers to Rouge and Blaze. "Should we tell her?"

Rouge whispers back, "I think we should." With that, Mina glances back at Amy. It's her turn to tell the facts.

"Ever since the very beginning of this semester, we were actually drawn to the popularity and 'coolness' of Sally and Fiona. We were eager to break the ice, so we asked if we could hang out with them at some time—and so we did. However, things didn't turn out as we expected; in reality, they are nothing but a bad influence for us. Despite all that, we refused to leave them because we were all blinded by the truths and that we all have one thing in common: we're deeply infatuated to each of the Hedgehogs 5x.

"It finally came to our sense that just because we were attracted to their popularity, doesn't mean we really wanted to be true friends with them at all. At first, we thought they wanted to be friends with us, but—"The singer pauses so she could take a deep breath, "it turns out that they were using us this whole time."

"Using you?" Amy asks.

Mina persists, "Yes, they never wanted to be friends with us all along. They only used us for our abilities; you know: Rouge's style, Blaze's brains, and my fun activity ideas. They really took advantage of us."

Rouge takes her place for the next part, "You don't even know what it's like to have your activity ideas for school events and new outfit designs stolen by those two and they took all the credit."

Blaze cuts in, "And you don't even want to know how painful it was for me to do all the assignment and homework for them. They still get the academic credit despite that they did nothing at all."

"All in all," Mina stated, "not only we were the so-called followers, we were mostly slaves. And—we're not as evil as Sally and Fiona are. We would never do anything like that to hurt anyone."

Amy is more surprised at this fact. She cannot believe her eyes.

"So," the bat concludes, "after coming back to reality when we noticed how much damaged we caused to you before and what they have been doing to us, we chose to quit."

Another moment of silence has occurred. Amy mentally jots down everything they have said. It's becoming clear now.

"That makes so much sense now," the Rose whispers to herself.

The cat then tenderly places her hand on top of hers; Amy glances back at them and she could finally see their apologetic faces, only this time with more emotion than earlier.

"Amy," Blaze says as she slowly pulls her hand away, "I know it's really complicated for you to forget, but—can you still forgive us? And look, as soon as you forgive, we will always be on your side from now on. Please?"

The hedgehog looks down as they gave her a second to think about it. After understanding all the facts about them, she already thought about it and she finally makes her decision.

She looks back at them—and then she lets out a small smile, even though she's still feeling solemn deep inside.

"Yes, I forgive you." she tells them.

Everyone is relieved and they, too, smile back at her.

"And," Blaze asks her once again, "is it also okay if we all start over again and be friends?"

"I'd like that very much," the Rose replies.

"Oh, thank God," Mina happily whispers. The rest giggles at her reaction.

Soon afterwards, Amy goes into her bag. She digs her hand inside, going through her necessities.

"Before we head off to our next class, there's something that I might want to give you three." She informs.

One second later, she takes her hand and grasping in her fingertips—are three roses: one green, one white, and one red. She hands them to Mina, Blaze, and Rouge.

Amy resumes her statement, "The Hedgehogs 5x gave me these earlier, but—I decided to give away three of them, to you."

With that said, she gives the green rose to Mina, the red rose to Rouge, and finally the white rose to Blaze. Amy lets out another warming smile as she persists, "Those three are really from Manic, Shadow, and Silver. I've heard that you three have something in common with them, so I've decided to at least do something to keep the compatibility going."

This stuns them.

"Wow, this is really thoughtful of you. Thank you." Blaze comments.

"Thanks," Rouge and Mina did the same, though inarticulately.

"You're welcome." Amy replies as she, along with the rest, gets up from their seats. Right before they exit out of the library, she changes the subject.

"Now, just out of curiosity… what do you think Sally and Fiona are doing right now during their suspension?"

* * *

_Meanwhile…_

Sally and Fiona are both at the fox's house. Sally has something in mind to get back at Amy Rose, yet again. Their first revenge didn't exactly work out as they plan—so for this one… let's just say they're going to need more than just humiliating her. It's far more than humiliation. It's—more drastic and hazardous than just throwing food and revealing Amy's scars.

Both girls are really in Fiona's bedroom. While smoking their cigarettes and filling the room with smoke, Fiona goes through her drawers in search for something that they could use.

"You sure we could do this, Fi?" Sally says as she exhales and holding the cigarette in between her fingers.

"Positive," Fiona responds with hers in between her lips to hold in place whilst opening more drawers. "Like I said, I don't give a flying damn if my parents ground me for life."

"God, I'm so glad you brought me into this. This feels so good." The chipmunk comments as she takes a whiff from the strong, burning scent.

"I know, isn't it?" The fox remarks with a malevolent smirk.

After opening a couple more drawers, she finally finds what she's looking for: a small rectangular wooden box.

"Bingo, baby," Fiona takes the box out of the drawer and then sets it on top of her bed, so Sally can get a closer look. While inhaling her cigarette, Fiona then taps the box twice with her free palm. Sally sits right next to her.

"This is it, Honey Acorn." She tells her. Subsequently, the two set their almost finished-cigarettes into the ashtray, sitting on the floor. Then, Fiona has both of her hands on the box, undoing the latch. "This is the moment we've been waiting for."

The rebel finally opens the box—showing the inside to Sally. The former leader of the group let out a stunned, silent gasp after seeing what's inside. After that—she lets out a wicked smile.

"God, this is too perfect. I can't believe you actually carry that. How and where did you get it?"

The fox playfully shrugs, "I know a guy." And she laughs.

"Fi, I know for sure that this will definitely work. Once we get that thing on Amy Rose—she's going to wish that she was never even born." Sally commences and laughs as she takes her cigarette back from its tray.

Fiona does the same, "True that. This will teach her a lesson on never messing with us and never stealing our men." She inhales the smoke.

"Also," Sally continues, "who needs Rosy or those other girls when we still got each other? After all, it's still two against one."

"Exactly," Then, both girls gaze back at the object inside the box—which happens to be a deadly weapon. They stare at it, admiring its beauty.

The weapon: a dagger.


	9. The Terror

The Terror

_Everything is dark, though she can still see where she is. The place she's currently in is scarce—scarce enough to hear her own voice in an echo. Aside with the partial darkness, there are sounds of a girl weeping._

_She had her eyes closed and after whimpering for over a minute, she languidly opens them._

"_This isn't real… this is a nightmare… it's only just a dream… I know it…" She laments to herself while crouching down and feeling the stinging sensation on both of her wrists. They're deeply and freshly slashed._

_But—didn't she already make a pact not to harm herself?_

"_If this isn't real, then why are you bleeding, honey?" Her tormentor screams at her. "You know how it works; you don't get hurt when you're in a dream, bitch. And, you're hurt, aren't you? So that means that you're not dreaming at all!" Then, the victimizer lets out a wicked laugh. It sounded so shrill, like a devil._

_However—there's not one, but only two victimizers: one fox and one chipmunk._

"_And also, doesn't this remind you of something, darling?" The second tormentor wickedly asks her and then laughs. _

"_You are so weak. It's no wonder you couldn't defend yourself every time this happens to you. Why can't you stand up for yourself?"_

_Hearing this atrocity is harming her. They're reminding her of her horrid past back in the institution. The pain is returning… the emotional abuse is coming back._

_The blood is running… it's dripping onto the floor… she's on the urge to pass out… she's crying in deep pain._

"_Please, stop… leave me alone…" she weakly says._

"_No! That is not enough!" the fox screams, "Not until you learn to fight back! Now… GET UP!"_

_She can't get up, not even an inch off the ground. After idling onto the floor, the fox hands the weapon to the chipmunk as she gets closer to the vulnerable victim and she harshly grabbed her shoulders. She fiercely forces her to stand up and lean against the wall. This atrocity is scaring the victim as she is literally crying her eyes out as blood is still visible in her hands._

_To make sure that she doesn't escape, the fox pins her shoulders securely on the wall—too secure, that she's nearly crushing her bones. The poor victim is struggling to escape from her grasp, but she has not enough strength. The fox lets out a malicious, sadistic smirk, for she enjoys watching the pain on her face._

_With her incarcerated, the fox gazes at the chipmunk and she gestures her to do it now. With pleasure, the chipmunk lets out a malevolent smirk, just like her partner, and she stood right in front of the victim. She holds the weapon up—pointing it at her side._

_The victim can barely see it, so she is too overwhelmed due to the severe atrocity._

"_Say goodnight, Amy Rose," the chipmunk says in an eerie sing-song tone._

_Finally… she makes her aim…_

…_forceful enough to make a 'thud' sound on the wall…_

_And…_

_Amy Rose collapses on to the floor…_


End file.
